Mornin! This is Sean McNulty and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on TUESDAY August 23, 2022.

Where a toast 🥂 goes out to WB and Baz Luhrmann for making “Elvis” his top grossing US pic ever yesterday. #SorryLeo (although “Gatsby” still has the King by about $80 Million globally).

Both the film and marketing campaign delivered the goods, making a real movie theater experience as hoped for, and overcoming questions from folks like yours truly about whether enough folks would show up for an “Elvis” pic in 2022.

Enjoy your well-deserved bonuses! 😁

IN THIS EDITION

• A look at what’s behind the varying degrees Movie Theater chain stock dives right now - from mild to whoa, and what lies ahead for the rest of the year.

• Francis Ford Coppola adds to cast of “Megalopolis”

• PEACOCK is giving “The Resort” a NBC primetime shot

• DISNEY+HOTSTAR gets a new leader, and more

📽 THE SILVER SCREEN

JUST 5 THINGS

• DISNEYFOX sets Owen Teague (“It”) to play the lead primate in the “Planet of the Apes” reboot or continuation or whatever it’s gonna be from writer / director Wes Ball (“Maze Runner” pics). /Deadline

• Frances Ford Coppola adds Aubrey Plaza to next pic “Megalopolis”, starring Adam Driver, Forest Whitaker, Laurence Fishburne and more. /Deadline

• NETFLIX will premiere the “Knives Out” sequel on Fri Dec 23. Movie theater plan listed as “TBA”.

• Kevin Costner adds Luke Wilson to his new Civil War-era Western pic “Horizons”, to be distributed by WB. Sienna Miller and Sam Worthington already on board. /Deadline

• A24 sets Harris Dickinson (“Where The Crawdads Sing”) to star with Zac Efron in decades-long wrestling family dynasty pic “The Iron Claw”. Sean Durkin (“Martha Marcy May Marlene”) is directing. /Deadline

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📺 THE TV SET

@brettybucketsFollow the lights 🤯 also this new show is awesome! #hotd #gameofthrones #GoT #houseofthedragon #nyc

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HBO gets 10 Million viewers for “House of the Dragons” premiere across platforms

Not that we need NIELSEN numbers when we have TIKTOK 👆 (so who’s gonna volunteer to stand outside that building at 9pm on Thurs Sept 1 btw? 👀#LOTR).

Biggest series premiere in HBO history. Although granted - also HBO’s first spin-off series to my recollection until someone embarrassingly emails me otherwise 🧐. “Entourage” and “Ballers” being spiritual bros at best.

No breakout of HBOMAX #s vs Linear numbers yet because… well now that wouldn’t get two days worth of free press now would it? /THR

Although I’m sure this is already more detail than we’ll get from AMAZON on “LOTR”… and this is where the whole “Dragons face-off” thing falls apart. I stand by this assessment:

Sean McNulty @theseanmac

The #HouseOfTheDragonHBO & #LOTR 'face off' would be a lot more fun if they were on the NBC & CBS Fall Thursday night schedules at 9p. In 1994. #StreamingIsLessFun #TeamER

2:25 PM ∙ Aug 18, 2022

• Connected TV viewership counter SAMBA TV put the US streaming viewership at 2.6 Million accounts on Sunday. That’s only representative from their sampling of 3 Million households who watch via smart TV’s, does not include mobile, etc. /Deadline

ABC orders new Milo Ventimiglia drama “The Company You Keep” for midseason

Shades of “Out of Sight” - A con man & CIA agent have a super hot one night hookup that leads to the feels…🥰 but they’re unknowingly gonna interact professionally as well, as he looks to ramp up the family con biz so he can get out of it… and she closes in on the guy whom his family owes a lotta cash.

From showrunner Julia Cohen (”A Million Little Things”). /THR

ALSO IN TV

• NBCU is airing PEACOCK series pilot for “The Resort” at 9p tomorrow night on NBC after the live-results “AGT” show. /THR

• Juliana Margulies is returning for “The Morning Show” season 3 at APPLE TV+. /Variety

• NETFLIX adds Debi Mazar to contemporary Greek mythology series “Kaos” with Jeff Goldblum (Zeus), Janet McTeer and David Thewlis. Debi is playing Medusa. Show is from Charlie Covell (“End of the F***ing World”) and now shooting. /Deadline

• HULU adds Merritt Weaver & Michaela Watkins to “Tiny Beautiful Things” series based on Cheryl Strayed’s best seller. Kathryn Hahn already set to star. Liz Tigelaar (“Little Fires Everywhere”) is showrunning, Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern are among the producers. /Deadline

• FOX NEWS’s Streaming service FOX NATION is getting into the TV movie biz to provide a little something just for the ladies apparently. Launching 4 pics, starting on Sept 1. /THR

IN THE GLOBAL EXECUTIVE SUITE

• DISNEY+HOTSTAR has a new leader - Sajith Sivanandan is coming over from GOOGLE after 15 years, where he led GOOGLE PAY and was a Managing Director. He’ll report into DISNEY Int’l Chairman Rebecca Campbell. /Deadline

💻 THE MEDIA BIZ

A bad day for the top 2 Movie Theater chain stocks…

Well two in particular, AMC (-41%) and of course CINEWORLD aka REGAL CINEMAS (-27%).

#3 chain CINEMARK was also -6% and IMAX -4%… but this is really a CINEWORLD problem. And it’s big.

AMC is essentially getting caught in collateral damage given its meme-stock investor base, but they still have their own set of issues #StockDilution

IS THE MOVIE THEATER BUSINESS OK?

OK? Yes. Great? No.

Remember no one turned a profit in Q2 even with “Top Gun”, “Jurassic World”, “Sonic 2” and plenty of other top performing pics so… that’s a problem.

And Q3 is gonna be is already very dark… and while the Anime pic was a nice small boost this weekend, Q3 will need some surprise hits to emerge in Sept to salvage something.

For context:

• AMC THEATERS: 7600 screens, 600 theaters in US

  • LONG TERM DEBT: $5.4 Billion

  • Q2 LOSS: -$121 Million on Revenue of $1.2 Billion

  • OTHER:

    • US is about 80% of business, Int’l 20%

    • Had negative Q2 Cash Flow

• REGAL CINEMAS (CINEWORLD): 7k screens, 530 theaters in US

  • LONG TERM DEBT: $5 Billion

  • OTHER:

    • Big UK presence (US is about 65% of biz, UK about 20%)

    • This is a UK company so their financial reporting schedules are different/no Q2 reporting specifically.

• CINEMARK: 4400 screens, 320 theaters in US

  • LONG TERM DEBT: $2.5 Billion

  • Q2 LOSS: -$74 Million on $744 Million of Revenue

  • OTHER:

    • Q2 did have a decent one-time impairment charge altering profitability.

    • Had positive Q2 Cash Flow

    • Also has big Latin America presence, about 20% of their biz

• IMAX: 360 US screens (but near 1600 globally)

  • Q2 REVENUE: $74 Million, LOSS: $3 Million

• And then there are a handful of much smaller players domestically (MARCUS etc) and numerous independent cinemas of course.

OK IMAX and CINEMARK first

Their financial situations still look to be relatively fine to get them thru til Q4 (oh 👋 “Black Panther 2” and “Avatar 2” - although THANKSGIVING is looking a little 😯).

So traditional moviegoing headwinds exist but certainly will live another day, and IMAX had a good Summer.

SO WHAT’S AMC’S STORY

Well it depends on how closely you want to dive into the wacky world that AMC CEO Adam Aron has fostered (thankfully Bloomberg did that this week already).

As you probably know, it’s been an extremely volatile stock ever since it became a ‘meme stock’ (a la GAME STOP but not as insane) at the top of the pandemic.

So - shocks like the CINEWORLD situation can cause a lot of panic that… isn’t entirely related. CINEWORLD is a mess. AMC’s a circus.

Predicting AMC’s stock is a fool’s errand. It could easily catch fire further from the CINEWORLD embers and cause real damage here, but today’s carnage is likely contained for the moment. Likely.

But the bigger picture issue is that AMC has issued millions of shares in the past 2 years, so while the stock price is still healthy, it’s shareholder value is heavily diluted.

Analyst Rich Greenfield puts this succinctly, and in a uniquely Rich way of course:

Rich Greenfield, LightShed 🔦 @RichLightShed

Every $AMC share tomorrow represents just 1/10 of what it did in Feb 2020 Feb 2020: 104 million shares outstanding Aug 2022, 2022: 1.034 billion shares outstanding Adam "PT Barnum" Aron has duped investors for his own personal gain as he sells every share he gets

8:18 PM ∙ Aug 21, 2022

---

56Likes12Retweets

Aron also issued something called an AMC “APE” stock yesterday, which is kinda like a bonus for his meme-stock fanboys… or a stock-split (aka further dilution) depending on your POV, but even I’m bored by this so I’ll leave it to CNBC to explain.

So their -42% drop was part due to this new APE stock issuance seen as a dilution of shareholder value, and part picking the absoulte worst day in 2022 to issue said stock with CINEWORLD saying bankruptcy is “possible”.

Overall, AMC THEATERS is still losing money, and has a horrible Q3 ahead like everyone, but there’s little reason to believe there is imminent danger here - save for anything insanely unforseen that comes from the meme-stock investor cult base that Aron has fostered.

OK SO… YEAH, ABOUT CINEWORLD / REGAL CINEMAS

Yeah this is grim. $CNNWF stock is trading at 4 cents. The market value is just $63 Million total.

If the stock keeps on falling double digit% a day… this fire sale will happen real quick and be ugly. Or well I guess uglier.

Either way, selling off or more likely closing low-performing theaters is a real possibility here, so some small US markets could lose their theaters. Many of whom likely contributed to making a movie like “Elvis” a hit this Summer.

But CINEWORLD’s severe issues are pretty much isolated to CINEWORLD… even when a bankruptcy / debt restructure / sale or new investor happens etc, REGAL will (very likely) live on… with some very worse for the experience investors in its wake.

But given its pure size, whatever form the company and its theaters emerge in… the US Movie Theater ownership will be decidedly altered when the savior 4th Quarter kicks into high gear.

TAKEAWAY

Q3 will continue to be terrible, we knew it would be terrible and CINEWORLD’s safety rope has just run out. But if big movie theater companies can’t turn a profit in Q4 (or come very close) then we really need to start talking.

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🏦 STOCK NOTES

Not great day all around

DISH -5% ($17.46)

PARAMOUNT -5% ($24.56)

NETFLIX -6% ($226.54)

AMC NETWORKS -7% ($26.16)

WBD -7% ($12.71)

ALTICE -7% ($9.90)

BUZZFEED -13% ($1.57)

👩‍💻 NEW TO WATCH:

“Top Gun: Maverick” now avail for Digital download purchase

🎥 TRAILER HOUSE

NETFLIX “Lou” movie trailer - Allison Janney goes all Liam Neeson on us as a woman with a mysterious past and a particular set of skills who’s living off the grid, when she’s enlisted by rural neighbor Jurnee Smolett to help find her daughter when she’s kidnapped… potentially leading to a much bigger secret. PREMIERES FRI SEPT 23

NETFLIX “Sheng Wang: Sweet and Juicy” comedy special trailer - Directed by Ali Wong, this trailer is all in one section/topic but - some good laughs here. PREMIERES TUE SEPT 6

NETFLIX “Love is Blind: After the Altar” Season 2 trailer - PREMIERES FRI SEPT 16

NETFLIX “The Anthrax Attacks” docu trailer - Reliving the early 2000s Anthrax in the mail adventures the country went thru about 20 years ago, along with some dramatic re-enactments of things.

A D’OH and a Clarification

🤦‍♂️ - “DC’s Secret Life of Pets” global gross so far is $130 Million, not $30 Million. Always helps to hit the ‘1’.

😬 - My phrasing wasn’t ideal in the OWN execs item yesterday - The scripted series future at OWN appears to be over, not at HARPO naturally.

🎧 PLAYING ME OFF

New MAISIE PETERS “Good Enough” - Yeah, think we’ve all been in dating situations like this at one point in our lives and had this realization. This is great. Tough, but great 👏.

If you need some new tunes:

THE WAKEUP Spotify playlist

Email me anytime at seanmcnultynyc@gmail.com or connect here on LINKED IN.

-SEAN MCNULTY

@theseanmac on TWITTER

@TheWakeupNews on INSTAGRAM