Showbiz Sandbox 580: Warner Bros. Enters Its Discovery Phase
April 12, 2022
Last week Discovery closed its $43 billion deal to acquire WarnerMedia from telecom giant AT&T. Discovery topper David Zaslav immediately installed his own executive team to run Warner Bros. Discovery forcing the existing management team to head for the door. We discuss the fallout from the merger and the what the future may look like for the combined company.
One of the exiting executives was WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar whose infamous Project Popcorn opened all 18 Warner Bros. theatrical releases throughout 2021 day-and-date with HBO Max. Kilar claims the controversial distribution strategy was a success, but if that’s true, then why did Warner Bros. discontinue it?
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including the big winners at the Olivier Awards, “Dancing with the Stars” moves to Disney+ and members of the original Grateful Dead rock band will stop touring after five decades.
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Showbiz Sandbox 576: Director Frank Marshall Strikes A New Note With Jazz Fest
March 15, 2022
Frank Marshall is probably best known as a producer of some of Hollywood’s biggest films, but he has also directed four successful narrative features throughout his career. More recently he has turned to directing documentaries, including “Jazz Fest: A New Orleans Story,” which he co-directs with Ryan Suffern. Marshall joins us to discuss the film, which premiered at this year’s SXSW Film Festival ahead of its theatrical release.
Meanwhile, as we inch our way closer to this year’s Academy Awards ceremony, the Directors Guild, BAFTA and the Critics Choice Awards were all announced over the weekend, helping to better define who may take home an Oscar.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including how compact disc sales are on the rise (sort of), Amazon launches a live DJ streaming service and this year’s Olivier Award nominations.
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Showbiz Sandbox 246: The Emmys Have A Hopeless Scheduling Problem
August 26, 2014
It’s bad enough that the Emmy Awards honor the exact same talent and television shows every year. Now, the Emmys are really growing stale by handing out prizes to shows that finished airing before last year’s ceremony. Unfortunately, as television migrates to year round programming, there is no good time to schedule the Emmys which would make them feel more timely or relevant.
The industry-at-large was likely glad to see at least one aspect of the Emmys go unchanged as shows from broadcast and cable networks continue to win the most awards over shows from streaming services such as Netflix, which went home empty handed. There also, thankfully, seems to be a voter backlash against shows positioning themselves in odd categories.
Meanwhile, August has proven to be the cruelest month for show business with the untimely death of actor Robin Williams and the passing of Hollywood legend Lauren Bacall, among others.
Of course, we also cover the week’s top entertainment news stories including Amazon public relations battle with Hachette over e-book pricing, Jimmy Fallon comes out on top in the late night television war, and Anne Rice’s Vampire Lestat may see new life on the big screen.
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