☀️Hollywood Oscar Ad Buys MIA; ‘One Battle’ Takes 🏆
Which DISNEY properties got Oscars ad time / UNI, A24 see box office wins / PAR buys out Tyler Perry
Evenin! 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 SUNDAY, March 8, 2026.
Where it’s a good thing Hollywood is giving out plenty of trophies tonight, as F1 is gonna take a pass for the month of April.
Yes, it seems the only place you’ll see F1 races in the Middle East (or anywhere for that matter) in April is if you rewatch Brad Pitt on APPLE TV, as F1 indeed canceled its upcoming races in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia due to the war in Iran, leaving a month-long hole in the annual calendar.
BUT: College hoops has ya covered — here’s your men’s March Madness 🏀 bracket so you can totally make back all that money you lost on your Oscars bets.
AND: Jack Black will be your next SNL host on April 4 with Jack White handling the tunes (the next 2 Saturdays are off).
WELL: Sorry, Buffy fans — you’re not getting your reboot. HULU is not moving forward after the Chloé Zhao-directed pilot.
OH: If you need further evidence your favorite social app is #ShadyAF — TIKTOK U.S.’ new owners including Ellison’s ORACLE, WME-owner SILVER LAKE, Abu Dhabi’s MGX and others who “won” the TIKTOK U.S. auction from the Trump administration are paying said Trump administration roughly $10B as a kickback thank-you fee for “brokering” the deal — ya know, totally customary on a deal with a total value of, uh, $14B.
YUP: FCC head Brendan Carr once again showed he isn’t too sure what his remit is — taking the opportunity of a #TrumpTweet about “misleading” Iran war coverage which specifically called out the NY Times and WSI, which are uh, not-broadcast TV outlets . . . to once again issued a threat on something he doesn’t have the sole right to determine or do by a mile (as FCC commish Anna Gomez reminded folks):
“Broadcasters that are running hoaxes and news distortions — also known as the fake news — have a chance now to correct course before their license renewals come up.”
“The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will lose their licenses if they do not.”
THEN: AMAZON PV is hopping on the #pricehike train starting April 10 — the ad-free tier will now be $5 on top of your monthly $15 AMAZON PRIME subscription (+$2). Look, that new NBA check doesn’t write itself, America.
You do get higher-resolution video, the ability for 5 concurrent streams and 100 downloads. You get 4 streams and 50 downloads on the included ad tier.
ALSO: The LIVE NATION anti-trust trial will continue today as over 30 states did not sign onto the DOJ’s . . . curious agreement.
WAKEUP BOX OFFICE POLL
Kudos to the 15% bulls on UNI’s Reminders of Him who believed in the female-driven Hoover book club crowd!
AND: I’ll have the breakdown of the Box Office Top 10 including a nice showing from A24 after the Oscars breakdown below, including the expert take from Prestige Junkie’s Christopher Rosen.
WAKEUP Oscars TV Audience Poll
Ok, we haven’t crossed 20M Oscars viewers since 2020 . . . is this the year? The last two years were 19.7M and 19.5M.
Remember that we have NIELSEN BIG DATA + PANEL data metrics this year and full out-of-home coverage too.
OSCARS 2026
So, who had 3h 44min in the office pool?
Now, who wants some BURGER KING! I had no idea their business had fallen off so much — then again, the company seems to have a lotta cash left for Oscar ad time buys given it did a full top and tail ad buy around a segment of the show tonight.
As for the show — the Weapons opening was inspired 👏 (with a great Beastie Boys music choice), leading into a monologue that started great (I’m famously a sucker for a computer keyboard joke) . . . and then yeah, kinda lost steam — and we probably coulda done without the lengthy Conan giving an award to Conan bit.
But otherwise, most of the other Conan bits redeemed that one — though I especially loved the nod to The Oscars going to YOUTUBE.
Now, some awards.
THE RANDOS 🏆
BEST EXECUTIVE SHOUT OUT
Ted Sarandos, welcome to something called a theater! And thanks to Ted for playing along with the joke.
HONORABLE MENTION: The cutaway shot to Josh & Dana sitting next to each other.
MOST HEARTLESS ACADEMY MOVE
Cutting off the KPop Demon Hunters guy in the Best Song speech. Just cold-hearted.
NICEST PRESENTER SURPRISE
Ok, yes, seeing Jimmy Kimmel on an ABC broadcast isn’t exactly a shock — but a great choice for the Docs presenter this year.
ONGOING CONVERSATION I KINDA WOULDA LOVED TO HEAR
Whatever Ethan Hawke and Jacob Elordi were seemingly discussing on numerous cutaways.
JUST REALLY WELL DONE
That Billy Crystal / Rob Reiner opening to a well-done In Memoriam overall with Rachel McAdams and Barbra Streisand definitely stayed with me after the show.
BIGGEST FLUB
I dunno! Just a well-produced show — the biggest thing would be leaving Conan on stage for about 8 seconds without giving him his cue at one point toward the end of the show, which was . . . revealing.
Or perhaps an unexpectedly raucous documentary nominee section in the rafters — advantage Kimmel over Conan on handling those moments on the fly.
BEST HEADLOCK
Gotta say, loved this.
BEST AD
Yeah . . . that DISNEY Cruise Lines father/son ad got me.
LEAST HONORABLE MENTION: Why is ROLEX using the same song from the MODELO beer ads?
WHO BOUGHT ADS
Ok, back to something I know a lot more about — marketing.
I’ll break down who the DISNEY promo department gave love to (did the Super Bowl really need a spot?).
Plus, who spent the big $2M-ish on ad buys tonight to promote shows and movies — could Hollywood movie studios top their whopping . . . 1 ad buy from last year? There were 5 in 2024.
To start — AMAZON’s move kinda says it all about how Madison Avenue views this event: