ICYMI: Tech Talent Job Wars; WBD Woes; Fall of Hollywood Empire
Catch up on our recent best
“You may not be interested in politics, but politics is interested in you.” I can’t help but think of this line from the late American philosopher Marshall Berman after a week so dominated by politics that it inevitably informed our coverage of the entertainment business as well. Richard Rushfield drew trenchant parallels between the leaders in Hollywood and D.C. and their abject failure to react to the moment. Andy Lewis chronicled J.D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy from page to screen and how that Hollywood biopic, reviled by critics, only burnished Donald Trump’s VP nominee. Politics even reared its head in Entertainment Strategy Guy’s exploration of how YouTube could be stopped — and not by the party you think.
Politics surely aren’t done with us yet in 2024, and we’ll be here to help make sense of the major moves that have implications for our business (like, say, a Warner Bros. Discovery sale, which Sean McNulty deftly analyzed after this week’s bombshell analyst call for a breakup). But rest assured, there’s plenty of politics-free coverage here, in case you missed it:
Extreme Tech Makeover: Hollywood Edition
Legacy studios, in an effort to compete with their tech rivals, are courting data scientists and engineers (far more than creatives, alas). In this week’s Series Business (paid subscribers-only), Elaine Low dives into where Hollywood has an edge, and the two big things it’d have to change to win:
We’ve Seen This Movie Before
Wondering why studios just can’t get enough reboots on their slates these days? Peter Kiefer explains why, breaks some news on the Ghost, Dirty Dancing and Backdraft revivals in development and details the rules of the “genre” and the plight of the young execs who bear the brunt of it:
Rushfield: Killer Elite, the Summer That Changed Everything
The fate of our country’s politics these days lays in the hands of rulers unwilling to cede power and unable to embrace the future. Sound familiar?:
Richard also chatted with Chris Nashawaty, the author of a forthcoming book that dissects the eight iconic sci-fi movies that all hit theaters over eight weeks in the summer of 1982 — and the lessons for Hollywood today:
YouTube’s Nightmare
Ted Sarandos made nice about YouTube on its earnings call this week, saying, “We kind of feed each other pretty nicely.” But make no mistake: The world’s largest video platform is ready to take over your living room. Which makes it the perfect moment for Entertainment Strategy Guy (paid subscribers-only) to delineate how regulators and competitors could topple Google’s giant:
An Elegy for Hillbilly Elegy
Hollywood depoliticized J.D. Vance’s Rust Belt origin story, and in doing so, Andy Lewis writes, gave Trump’s VP pick the best campaign video since Bill Clinton’s The Man From Hope:
Prestige Junkie: Shogun Creators Talk on Nom Day
Rachel Kondo and Justin Marks, the creators of FX’s Shogun, which scored a series-leading 25 Emmy noms on Wednesday, spent part of their big day with our awards editor Katey Rich to talk about it. If the most creative people in Hollywood are reading and listening to Katey, you should be too:
THE WAKEUP
With WBD now in play and earnings season underway, you need to be reading Sean for the depth and analysis you won’t find anywhere else:
🎧 PODCASTS
THE ANKLER
WBD Woes and an Uncertain Future The studio sets yet another round of mass layoffs as an analyst goes on the attack:
👓 THE OPTIONIST
FINAL HOUSEKEEPING!
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