Mornin! This is Sean McNulty (connect with me on LINKEDIN here if ya like or email me at seanmcnultynyc@gmail.com), and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on Thursday, June 18, 2026.

Where Ben Stiller made the worst-kept secret of June official, announcing a KNICKS doc for HBO with A24 and covering the various eras of the franchise up through the championship this year. So, perhaps in the vein of Bill Simmons’ excellent HBO Celtics City docuseries last year.

KNICKS owner James Dolan has also accepted an invite for the team to visit the White House (date TBA), which will be the first NBA team to do so in both of Trump’s presidential terms.

Well, it’s always good for teammates to have new things to talk about on the victory parade this morning (just maybe don’t bring a yellow school bus to get there).

ALSO: NYC is getting an . . . eighth area code, so let’s send a big welcome to the 465, yo! Sincerely, a 917 OG. (Someone’s gotta make a song with all of these, no?)

PLUS: The next AI frontier for DISNEY? AI ads — BI reports that DISNEY will begin testing an AI ad creator tool this July in beta for small and medium-sized businesses that will create video AI ads for you . . . so get ready to see those 3 times in a row in an ad break on HULU in the not too distant future.

SO: CHARTER has added NETFLIX to its App Store — it’s not included in its wide array of free streamers for its cable TV subs, but this addition does make for one destination for SPECTRUM subs to access all big streamer apps.

THEN: The NYT and its Hard Fork tech podcast hosts Kevin Roose and Casey Newton are parting ways at the end of summer, when the pod will add new talent, according to Reliable Sources.

ELSEWHERE: The NETFLIX We’re Back with Brian Williams ~~talk show~~ podcast launched the first of 24 weekly episodes today, with Tom Hanks. But yeah — this totally looks like a “podcast” production. NETFLIX, I really hate to be the one to tell you this . . . but you’re now pretty deep in the talk show business.

UM: ATWIST, the microdrama company founded by TV industry exes Jana Winograde, Susan Rovner and Lloyd Braun, is buying ad time in movie theater pre-shows via NATIONAL CINEMEDIA to promote its series, encouraging people to use a QR code on screen to watch the micro episodes on their phones (ATWIST will also produce ads for brand partners in those pre-shows).

Eh, I’m sure folks totally will just watch the shows later . . . and not on their phones in the theater instead of the trailers and ads.
Think we may have lost the plot on this one, theater advertising business.
NATIONAL CINEMEDIA runs the pre-shows in over 1,650 theaters nationwide.

YEAH: In the wake of FOX ROKU this week — this was a good WSJ read on a creator/entrepreneur clearing mid-six-figure revenue in the FAST space by making Black crime-world soap operas and movies primarily monetized via advertising rev-shares on FAST services like TUBI and ROKU (via an online distributor called FILMHUB who handles all the digital distro).

He shoots the non-union productions in Atlanta.

YAH: Stock trading business ROBINHOOD is shutting down its SHERWOOD NEWS website after 2 years and laying off staff as part of its 10% overall staff layoffs this week.

It will continue on in newsletter form with much lower overhead (the SHERWOOD media division grew out of ROBINHOOD’s acquisition of the MARKETSNACKS business newsletter in 2019).

OH: The DOJ has taken its next highly unusual move. After issuing its very odd statement last week on why it’s not contesting the WARNAMOUNT deal — this week, it’s intervening in an active lawsuit. The DOJ told a federal court to throw out a lawsuit in Mississippi from the NAACP on behalf of mostly Black residents who now live near numerous polluting gas turbines that power Elon’s xAI data centers that were installed near their homes.

The DOJ’s curious argument is essentially, who needs permits!? We need xAI for the Department of ~~War~~ Defense! Besides, don’t you know Elon’s the guy who saved a whole . . . $1B to $7B from the $7.4T U.S. federal government budget!? #DOGE

THEN: If you’re thinking of buying an APPLE product, maybe do that sooner rather than later — Tim Cook told the WSJ that APPLE would be raising prices due to increases in the price of memory and storage chips.

I mean, folks — we have to protect that $30B in quarterly APPLE Net Profit somehow, and that somehow . . . is you.

BUT: At least you’ll have plenty of money left over at the gas station, as gas is finally below $4 a gallon — enjoy the $3.99 at the pump this week, America! Well, that’s more for my Jersey readers than my Cali readers.

ALSO: At least HBO MAX is looking out for you now — new and returning subscribers can get 28% off an HBO MAX annual plan here. Deal is good through July 15.

REST IN PEACE: Goes out to a legendary name in stand-up comedy, Tom Dreesen, who died at the age of 86 this week.

OH: A pod conversation reco for the weekend — this Producer’s Guide pod with Todd Garner and Scott Stuber was great.

WAKEUP Box Office Prediction

The status quo on Toy Story 5 this weekend is $140M to $150M, with the bold thinking it could go up to $180M if it catches the wind just right.

I’ll pick my own tranche at $150M to $160M, aka the Inside Out 2 zone.

WAKEUP Housekeeping

I have a family event this afternoon, so I will be mostly off the grid today, which means no traditional Wakeup tomorrow (unless APPLE decides now is finally the time to buy DISNEY🤞) – but I may have a little something special for you. Stay tuned…