Cable News Chaos, Putin's Talk Therapy, and the New Game of Thrones

Happy New Year's Eve, and thanks as always for reading The Daily Courant, bringing you the inside conversation at the intersection of Hollywood, Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and Washington.

Today, we lead with the first installment of Matt Belloni's year-end countdown of his boldest, best sourced, and least predictable Hollywood predictions for 2022. Will the Obamas move to Holmby Hills? Can Jeopardy! split the baby? Is Vegas the next Los Angeles? How about The Rock as Kamala's running mate? All that and more in Part I, below...

Plus, below the fold, Julia Ioffe talks to her best inside sources about Joe Biden's unexpected, and potentially fortuitous, New Year's Eve phone call with Vladimir Putin. And Tina Nguyen examines the merits and contradictions of David McCormick's hybrid Youngkin-Miller campaign playbook. 

22 Surefire, 100 Percent Probable Hollywood Predictions for 2022 (Part I)

I polled some of my best sources for predictions that most people might not be thinking about, both big picture and small. Herewith, Part I...

Nobody needs me to make the same big-picture Hollywood predictions that we’ve all seen year after year: The “streaming wars” will lead to consolidation; Shari Redstone will sell ViacomCBS; Apple will (or won’t?) buy a legacy studio. Blah, blah. Someday those will come true and everyone will feel smart, just as we all did this year when AT&T predictably unloaded WarnerMedia and Amazon finally pulled the trigger on MGM.

Instead, I polled some of my best sources for predictions that most people might not be thinking about, both big picture and small. Some of these actually are happening, I just can’t report them definitively yet. And if you disagree, tell me why at matt@puck.news. Here are my first 11, and I’ll be back with the other half on Sunday…

1. The great theater contraction begins: I’m already hearing this from exhibition and distribution sources: In 2022, movie theater shrinkage will become a significant narrative. Even with Spider-Man: No Way Home, domestic box office in 2021 is on track to decline by about 60 percent from 2019, and forecasts for 2022 and 2023 aren’t great. Let’s say grosses eventually return to 80 percent of “normal;” that’s still not sustainable for mass-market theaters, which were struggling before the pandemic. This year’s lesson for studios is that most non-Marvel, adult-driven pictures should debut for the foreseeable future on streaming, which would eliminate the so-called “platform” release and those surprise breakouts of the recent past, like La La Land or Knives Out. Short of a government bailout, or studios cutting theaters in (like Universal is doing on its 17 day window), contraction from the current 44,000 U.S. screens seems necessary. And if AMC, the largest theater chain, ends its insane meme stock run, all bets are off on its future.  

2. Vegas bets on content: Pop stars have long taken advantage of Las Vegas for lucrative residencies. (Have you seen those ridiculous Adele prices?) Now the casinos want to expand beyond music. The Wynn hosted Paramount+’s big 1883 premiere this month and spent millions on a 1,700-square foot audio production space to lure sports podcasters. Video is next, and with sports gambling shows poised to boom along with relaxed gaming laws, other resorts are circling...

FOUR STORIES WE'RE TALKING ABOUT