Welcome back to What I’m Hearing...

Good evening, and a big welcome to new Puck author Eriq Gardner. As I’ve mentioned, Eriq covers how the law impacts media and entertainment. He’ll be contributing occasionally to What I’m Hearing at first, before we launch his own thing, and today I’ve excerpted (at the bottom) part of his piece about the First Amendment implications of Sarah Palin’s trial against the New York Times. Welcome, Eriq!

But first, on to the story of the week, and then my own reporting on one of the most talked-about deals in town…

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Thursday Thoughts (Jeff Zucker Edition)...

My Puck colleague Dylan Byers has been all over the surprise resignation of CNN president Jeff Zucker, including publishing a pretty extraordinary transcript of the shiny new asshole that WarnerMedia C.E.O. Jason Kilar was ripped last night by angry CNN staffers. Dylan’s latest piece tonight will tell you everything we know, including the fact that the investigation by the Cravath law firm is complete. But I’m also focused on what we don’t know, which is a lot. Here are my top five questions.

1. First, is this it? Zucker said he stepped down because he failed to disclose his  new-ish romantic relationship with communications chief Allison Gollust. But many people—including lawyers for Chris Cuomo, whose CNN firing sparked the investigation that led to Zucker’s downfall—believe there may be more to the story. Team Cuomo recently sent CNN a litigation hold letter, demanding that they preserve any communications between Zucker, Gollust and Gollust’s former boss, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo. Letters like that are often fishing expeditions, but Chris’ team believes Zucker may have also been cozying up to Andrew, including when he faced harassment claims—the exact reason Chris was fired in the first place.   
   
   
2. Everyone in the media, myself included, seems to think they knew Zucker and Gollust were a couple looooong before their relationship “changed” during Covid, as they say. But what did we actually know? ...

When the Antitrust Police Poke Around Hollywood Agencies

CAA, ICM, and the inside conversation about whether the Feds will crack down on Bryan Lourd and Chris Silbermann's starry merger.

Last time I was at the ICM Partners headquarters, a few years ago, for a very nice book party for Sherry Lansing, I remember being struck by the odd space it occupied, both physically and metaphorically. ICM was once arguably Hollywood’s most powerful talent agency, but it had long been outgunned by rivals CAA, WME, and UTA in size, revenue and glamourous clients—the accepted units of penis measurement with which agents typically judge each other.

By 2012, ICM was in pretty bad shape, saved only via a buyout led by C.E.O. Chris Silbermann. He pared it down, relaunched it as a “partnership,” and ran it as essentially a large boutique, with a few marquee creators (Shonda Rhimes, Bill Lawrence), a solid books department (Ta-Nehisi Coates, Walter Isaacson), and a couple legitimate stars (Samuel L. Jackson, Ellen Degeneres) to talk about in signing meetings. A good business, for sure, and starrier than the dozens of smaller agencies that pepper the peripheries of Hollywood, but hardly the power center its legacy might suggest...

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