☀️ 60 Minutes Ratings: Not How It Looks

Mornin! Here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2026.

Where enjoy your likely final moments of 30-year mortgage rates still being under 7% at least somewhere this week!

All due respect to the Emmys, but there’s nothing quite like the excitement of Fed meeting day. See you on the red carpet.

FIRST: NBC / PEACOCK got 6.7M viewers for the Emmys in early NIELSEN numbers.

• That’s -10% YoY, but above 2022’s 5.9M on NBC.
• Roughly 500k of the viewers were on PEACOCK (7.5%).

THEN: The Emmys are likely following the Oscars to streaming — albeit more quickly. According to Variety, the TV Academy is in talks with AMAZON PV about making it the show’s new home starting next year — 2 years before the Oscars move to YOUTUBE.

• The rotating broadcast networks were thought to be paying about $8M a year for the show, but no potential deal parameters have been reported so far.
• The Grammys start their new home on ABC/HULU in February.

OH: Former NYT Hard Fork podcast hosts Kevin Roose and Casey Newton are launching their new Machine Gods podcast at NPR.

AH: The NYT also set Michael Hirschorn as its new Media Columnist.

KUDOS: To Lena Dunham, who welcomed her first child with husband Luis Felber.

LO & BEHOLD: The Trump DOJ has come out in favor of having the state AGs put up the $1.9B bond in the WARNAMOUNT case . . . but the matter is in the hands of the California judge, not the DOJ. She will hold a hearing later next week.

• PLUS: The dates for the mandated 2-day WARNAMOUNT settlement talks between PSKY and the state AGs/WGA next month will be Oct. 14 and 15 . . . unless, of course, an agreement is reached prior to that date.

AND: AMAZON PV is now offering a new 5-streamer bundle for $30 a month (about a 40% discount):

• AMC+, BRITBOX, MGM+, PBS MASTERPIECE and STARZ

ALSO: Tarantino is releasing a The Adventures of Cliff Booth book on Dec. 8, essentially between the Cliff Booth theatrical run and the NETFLIX debut dates.

FINALLY: An addendum to yesterday’s look at the state of 3rd party film animation at NETFLIX — the streamer is also building up its own in-house film animation arm alongside the 2 remaining PAR/SKYDANCE pics and continued work with SONY PICS ANIMATION:

• Steps debuts this November, the first in-house animated pic under the Dan Lin / Hannah Minghella era.
• Charlie vs. the Chocolate Factory will be hitting theaters in November 2027 before coming to NETFLIX around Christmas.
• AND — a correction: Wish Dragon 2 will not be a NETFLIX Film. While NETFLIX & SONY were involved in the 2021 pic, neither is involved in the sequel. My apologies for the incorrect inclusion.

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📺 The TV Set

60 Minutes and the dark side of media industrial complex bias

To be clear up front on where I stand on 60 Minutes, one of my favorite shows — CBS NEWS leadership has completely botched its handling of the program this year, as I’ve written about many times already.

Firing talent and lead executives at your marquee show — which just increased ratings YoY and had no other major visible problems — just to “shake things up” is a hallmark move of either clueless or ill-intentioned management who seems to believe in a strategy of shooting yourself in the foot while your other foot is asleep.

Much less only to come back with a show that looked . . . almost exactly like the one you just tore to shreds behind the scenes!

• It featured the same format and 3 of the same correspondents from last season (and no, I’m not counting putting “the new guy” in the last 90 seconds of the show). Ah, wait, sorry — the background on the clock is now white. 🤯

Basically, if you’re going to go to the trouble of remaking a TV show in your image, at least have the courage to tell your audience you did so out of the gate.

That said: The media reporting industrial complex’s coverage of the 60 Minutes season premiere NIELSEN data is, on the whole, also an embarrassment — one that largely failed to encompass a key remit of reporting on numbers in the entertainment business.

Namely, context is key — so let’s dive into the key points to know.