☀️PAR Jobs Ax Falls Again; Reading WB/D Tea Leaves
NETFLIX doubles down on boxing / DIS & COMCAST settle HULU 💰 / UNI casts its Snoop Dogg
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 Tuesday, June 10, 2025.
Where this is how you do it, ladies and gentlemen. 🤯 The A’S may not have their own stadium anymore . . . but with Denzel Clarke in the outfield, it really doesn’t matter.
BUSTED: Gotta love China’s most popular AI bots temporarily disabling some functions during the country’s annual college entrance exams period so students couldn’t cheat.
HUH: The SmartLess guys are launching a . . . uh, discount mobile phone service called SMARTLESS MOBILE. Yeah, didn’t see that one coming either— but if Ryan Reynolds is an upcoming guest, expect a lot of trash talking.
EH: Vaccine policy medical advisory boards are overrated anyway, amirite? RFK Jr. promised to keep the panel in his confirmation hearing . . . although he didn’t, ya know, commit to who would be on it. Only 3.5 more years to go.
BUT: Some good news! We’ve found some good use for the abandoned Hollywood studio lots — the Zanuck Theater on the FOX lot hosted a school year-ending performance of 5th graders from the MARQUEZ Charter Elementary School this week, whose school burned down in the Palisades fires in January.
KUDOS: To the Women’s College World Series (WCWS) for getting its biggest TV audience ever. The game 3 finale had 2.4M viewers on ESPN Friday night (matching the NHL Stanley Cup game 1), following 2.1M each for the first 2 games.
AND: Our national nightmare is over.
AH: If you’re wondering why news publishers keep cutting jobs and costs this month . . . well, this chart from a new WSJ piece on how AI is eating website traffic is probably Exhibit A.
THEN: The WWE is moving the location for next year’s WrestleMania from NOLA and back to Vegas once again.
SO: AMAZON is spending $20B on building 2 data centers in Pennsylvania (including one at, yes, a former U.S Steel mill), in case you thought the $1.8B for the NBA was breaking the bank.
PLUS: A double plug!
Definitely check out Elaine’s new column on the realities of the buzzed-about digital Vertical Series business.
Also, check out how much one of the players in the space is paying for a showrunner role in my Tuesday Job Board list below. Hint — not exactly NETFLIX money. Or, likely, TUBI money, for that matter.
BTW: YOUTUBE has been favoring “freedom of expression” over content moderation in recent months. Read: Go hog wild, America! Er, as long as it’s in “the public interest,” of course. Welcome to the DGAF era of social media.
IN TODAY’S EDITION
Gotta love a busy Tuesday — it’s amazing what summer house season does to the early week news cycle . . .
The PAR job cuts, of course, and I look at some key details involving jobs / staff, subscriber counts, and the WBD sports empire, which nod to what’s ahead here.
You know it’s a busy day when the DISNEY/COMCAST HULU drama ending is the 3rd biggest item.
PLUS: NETFLIX dives further into boxing, while also announcing where it’s spending more money next (hint: it’s not the U.S.), and MAX sets its next global distro expansion plan.
AND: Of course the regular business of casting, release date announcements and more in movies and TV yesterday, and the jobs board — including a few creative exec roles! (remember, we have summer houses to get off to on Thursday night!).
💻 THE MEDIA BIZ
PARAMOUNT joins June Hollywood layoff cavalcade
Well, at least we’ve run out of studios to still cut jobs from, right? Although NBCU / VERSANT has been relatively quiet (their NYC office move is in August, so maybe there will be some culling at that point).
But yes, it’s PARAMOUNT’s turn, and here’s what theirs looks like.