☀️ NETFLIX Buys More Beckham, Taylor-Joy in New Deals
DISNEY India deal hits headwinds / WB's $8.5B Nevada bid / SIRIUS gets Alex Cooper
Mornin! This is Sean McNulty (connect with me on LinkedIn here if ya like), and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on WEDNESDAY, August 21, 2024.
Where ya know, I’m beginning to think that NETFLIX is no dummy. 🤔
With Beckham becoming one of its biggest docuseries ever last year . . . get ready for a Posh Spice Victoria Beckham docuseries, which is about to enter the production phase. Elaine — your wish for more late '90s pop culture nostalgia footage has been answered.
PLUS: Here is your latest in the burgeoning genre of #DisneySoExpensive stories, with NYT looking at families who go into debt to fulfill their kid’s dreams of going to the theme park.
A week for a family of 4 in the Pricey Kingdom can run from about $6,500 to more than $15,000 excluding travel costs (depending on how you roll), according to NERDWALLET. From this report, the upcharging for almost everything you want to do there once you get there sounds like the real hidden cost families are facing.
ALSO: You can add TARGET to the list of companies seeing results from cutting prices — Q2 revenue was +3% after cutting prices on 1,500+ items in the grocery category earlier this year, and it had previously announced plans to cut prices on another 5,000 items this summer, starting around Memorial Day (or halfway through Q2 👀).
AND: Add LOWES to the list of companies reporting lower spending by the American people in Q2, with revenue -5% and sales forecasts reduced for the rest of the year.
BUT: Enjoy those 2024 #pricehikes Hollywood, I’m sure you know something different than the vast majority of American companies in the D2C retail business. Look forward to seeing see you and ARPU in the Q3 and Q4 calls.
AND: The DNC topped the RNC in TV audiences on night 1 of their respective conventions, getting 20M viewers across 13 TV networks, with 15.3M folks 55 or older (75% of viewers).
The DNC’s 20M was roughly on par with 2020, but down from 26M in 2016.
MSNBC was #1 with 4.6M and CNN got 3.2M in 2nd.
This is roughly the size of a NFL Sunday Night Football game audience (albeit across 13 networks).
RNC night 1 was 18.1M across 12 networks (and had the same 55+ audience percentage), so it appears at least on night 1 — former President Obama was right about sequels.
THEN: Add CONDE NAST to the list of publishers handing over opening up their work to OPENAI for an undisclosed, but likely not too large, paycheck.
OH: The MTV VMAs added Lenny Kravitz (note for Gen Z readers — Zoe’s dad), Benson Boone, Halsey and LISA to the lineup on Sept. 11.
BTW: The chic STANDARD Hotels group is now part of the HYATT corporation, in a new $150M+ deal.
SO: The NFL will be doing a music performance halftime show in a . . . regular season game, as part of the PACKERS vs. EAGLES game in Brazil on PEACOCK in a couple weeks, with Anitta as the featured performer. /Variety
BUT: PEACOCK is not showing this performance — rather the service will somehow feature some highlights, and it’ll be on the NFL’s YT channel after the game.
THUS: There’s going to be a huge musical performance in the middle of a NFL game . . . that the game’s biggest broadcaster will essentially be ignoring. Yeah that makes sense.
OH: According to the WSJ, Wall Street bank investments in Elon’s TWITTER takeover are the worst merger-finance deal (“buyout”) since the Great Recession. It seems that the company’s subsequent drop in value has prohibited the banks, like MORGAN STANLEY, from offloading the debt from their books to someone else, as per typical industry norms (i.e. no one wants it).
FINALLY: Sign that I’m old and just don’t get it anymore, edition #386 — share of 19-year-olds with a driver’s license:
1983: 87.3%
2022: 67.9%
WTF teens?? Or really — WTF parents!? Teens cite “mom and dad will drive me” as a key reason for this.
