☀️ CBS Sets Spinoff Fall, ‘60 Minutes’ Boils Over
AMAZON enlists James Patterson / ROADSHOW gets new bidder / NETFLIX scores with Dutch hit
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 WEDNESDAY, April 23, 2025.
Where it’s kinda funny to see how many charts around human behavior seem to have similar rough demarcation points just like this chart (either going down like this one, or up in similar timeframes for things like teen depression and suicide) . . . which just happen to coincide with the rise of smartphones, and then social media platform use (i.e. interacting IRL with other humans less frequently, or at least not without faces buried in phones while next to each other).
Sure, the Great Recession and Covid also mix in there and other societal advancements over decades have lowered the birth rate in particular over time. Plus: Mix in an economy where younger generations increasingly can’t afford homes, etc.
But still — a curious recurring trend line across many aspects of society at minimum. BTW congrats on the 1% rise in birth rate last year, America!
All driven by Hispanic and Asian demographics, and the largest growth in births occurred with women ages 35-39 . . . although women 30-34 still dominate the count.
AND: The SAG Awards will be Sun. March 1 next year (the Oscars are set for March 15).
THEN: BET enlisted Kevin Hart to host the BET AWARDS in June.
AH: Another jury found that the NY Times did not libel Sarah Palin, after a 2-hour deliberation (a previous trial ran into procedural issues in the deliberation process).
ALSO: MAX now has an “add an extra member” function for accounts, for $8 extra a month. NETFLIX’s is $7 a month (MAX also costs $10 for the ad tier vs. NETFLIX’s $8). Keep an eye on your MAX password sharing.
The WSJ also confirms that yeah, WBD execs decided a year ago that MAX being “everything to everyone” wasn’t a great approach.
As Joe Flint puts it, consumers “already had a streaming service for every member of the household. It was called Netflix.”
Hence the moves we’ve seen to largely dump out of kids programming (Looney Tunes, Sesame Street etc), dialing back the Pimple Popper programming angle, and leaning into what the company has always done best — quality and buzzworthy series that attract attention, vs. a gross tonnage approach.
Always a good sign when a company leans into what it does best vs. trying to change its DNA — we’ll see the latest subscriber results in 2 weeks.
🎥 THE SILVER SCREEN
