Showbiz Sandbox 552: Disney and the Great “Shang-Chi” Experiment

August 19, 2021

First Disney tried to shame Scarlett Johansson for daring to sue them over the studios distribution strategy on “Black Widow.” Then during an earnings call the company’s CEO described the upcoming Marvel “Shang-Chi and the Legend Of The Ten Rings” as an “interesting experiment.” Simu Liu, the star of “Shang-Chi,” was quick to push back on such thinking, saying “We are the underdog; the underestimated.”

Meanwhile, actor Johnny Depp believes he is an underdog as well these days, claiming in an interview with The Sunday Times that Hollywood is boycotting him. International film festivals are doing the exact opposite however, honoring Depp for his body of work.

Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including “Funny Girl” is headed back to Broadway, the television game show “Jeopardy” officially has two new hosts and production of “The Lord of the Rings” Amazon series moves from New Zealand to the United Kingdom.

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Showbiz Sandbox 436: A Wealth in Diversity at Sundance

February 5, 2019

This year’s Sundance Film Festival was more diverse than it usually is in every way one might imagine. Sure, there were the usual crop of independent films and documentaries, but the predominance of women and people of color and queer voices was more notable than ever. In fact, female filmmakers took home most of the festival’s top prizes.

Sundance also proved to be a feeding frenzy for independent distributors with Amazon swooping in to spend more money than any other studio has ever spent during a single year at the festival. Usually, if one selection sells for over $10 million it makes headlines. This year there were at least three films that fell into that category.

Meanwhile the Super Bowl weekend proved to be a bust both at the box office, which was reached a 20-year-low, as well as on television, where the broadcast of the big game fell to a 10-year-low.

Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including Peter Jackson’s Beatles documentary, Hulu raises its prices and Spotify turns on a feature that allows users to turn off artists.

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Showbiz Sandbox 260: The Race To Build A Bigger, Louder And More Expensive Movie Theater

December 8, 2014

When it comes to giant screen cinema IMAX is still the most dominant player, but with theater owners building their own premium large format auditoriums new competitors have started to spring up. Dolby, a company known for cinema audio technology, is the latest to enter the fray with their own PLF offering that includes bigger screens, more immersive sound and, of course, a higher ticket price. Whether such offerings will catch on with moviegoers remains to be seen.

The only big news anyone in the entertainment industry wants to talk about right now is the cyber attack on Sony Pictures. Security experts say it’s shaping up to be the largest and most damaging hack against a commercial business in history. Authorities investigating the crime are no closer to catching the perpetrator than when the incident first made headlines two weeks ago.

The Grammy Awards were also making headlines last week. In fact, the annual music awards show tried to stay at the top of the news cycle by announcing nominees via various platforms throughout the course of an entire day. The real story however, turned out to be which musicians actually received nominations and which were overlooked.

Of course, we also cover the week’s top entertainment news stories including the name of the next James Bond film, U2 announces a world tour and CBS gets into another retransmission dispute.

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Showbiz Sandbox 243: United They Stand – SAG-AFTRA Forges Ground-Breaking Contract

July 7, 2014

Two years after merging their unions, and with their current contracts set to expire within hours, SAG-AFTRA reached an agreement with studios and producers for a new three-year contract. Jonathan Handel, an entertainment attorney and contributing editor at the Hollywood Reporter, discusses the proposed deal and what improvements actors managed to secure.

Music sales, on the other hand, aren’t improving at all. Nielsen reports that album and digital download sales for the first half of 2014 are down significantly. Could the increase in on demand music streaming be the cause?

Movies aren’t faring much better so far this year, at least not in North America and Germany where box office is down 12% and 8% respectively. Is something amiss with this summer’s blockbuster releases, or is setting new earnings records every year simply unrealistic?

Of course, we also cover the week’s top entertainment news stories including how the characters from “Frozen” are crossing over to television, why cable set-top boxes gobble up so much energy and The Who plan on saying a long, slow goodbye during yet another one of their farewell tours.

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