☀️Robust 🎥 Deal Week Capped By Hanks Pic
A24 adds Dua Lipa / The Oscars venue change / NETFLIX sets U.K. spy series
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 Friday, March 27, 2026.
Where I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news for you, America — that $2.8B that Larry Ellison & friends gave NETFLIX for walking away from WBD . . . isn’t going to you.
In fact, NETFLIX actually now wants more of your money too (but #goodnews — you now have something in common with Larry Ellison!), as it’s instituting another U.S. #pricehike, a little over 1 year after its last one in January 2025.
Ad tier: $9/month (+$1)
Ad-free: $20/month (+$2)
Bougie: $27/month (+$2)
Additional members: $7 w/ads, $10 ad-free (+$1)
I mean, you didn’t think boosting the annual content spend by about $2B this year was going to come from the office snacks budget, right? (The team needs its POPPI.)
Figuring some back-of-the-napkin rough math . . . that’s probably around an extra $1.4B to $1.7B of annual revenue, broadly speaking (assuming anywhere from 80M to 90M U.S. subs, and roughly 2/3 ad-free and 1/3 ad-tier split)
Skew those as ya like, as there’s no official data from NETFLIX, and add in however much “additional members” revenue as ya like, too.
NETFLIX now also has the priciest ad-free tier, and is tied for the cheapest ad tier price with PAR+ among all streamers (ex. ESPN).
On the upside, a gallon of gas will likely soon be the same amount as your monthly NETFLIX ad-tier subscription bill — so, in a sense, your subscription value is going up!
AND: Michael Jordan is getting the profile treatment on CBS Sunday Morning this weekend (mostly focused on his NASCAR career).
PLUS: NETFLIX picked up the Kill Tony show happening after WrestleMania night 1 next month. It’ll begin streaming the following Monday/promoted in RAW.
HMM: OPENAI’s ad effort hit $100M in annual run rate revenue in its first 6 weeks, according to The Information.
That headline again — OPENAI made about $12M in 6 weeks from showing ads to about 20% of its U.S.-based CHATGPT Free and Go users, or less than what Melania made at the box office in 2 weeks.
Granted — it’s essentially day 1 on a very long calendar, but also keep in mind this revenue likely includes some “Sure, I’ll try it out” money from ad buyers, and the company is basing that $100M number on that behavior/money staying around . . . which is uh, typically not how ad buying behavior goes.
OPENAI is now exposing ads to a much larger segment of users.
YUP: The Oscars, live from the PEACOCK Theater on YOUTUBE! Coming in 2029. We’ve got 3 years to figure out how to also fit META in there somehow.
As for the location’s name in 2029 — the PEACOCK deal began in 2023, and was only described as “multi-year.”
The previous 2 naming deals (NOKIA and MICROSOFT) were 8 years, which would keep PEACOCK on the theater at the 2029 Oscars time if NBCU agreed to a similar term.
BUT: It's certainly also possible PEACOCK’s deal with AEG was shorter or more flexible (did COMCAST make an 8-year bet in 2023 that PEACOCK would still be around in 2030?), potentially giving AEG the right to increase the fee/take other bids before the big show in 2029.
YAH: AMC THEATRES stock hit another new low yesterday, at $0.95 a share.
WELL: Elon’s 2024 lawsuit against advertisers alleging a conspiracy to withhold ad spending due to the platform’s policy changes (and after telling them to “go fuck yourself”) was dismissed by a Texas judge this week — “The only harm X has asserted is that its customers collectively chose X’s competitors over X.”
AH: Sheryl Sandberg’s LEAN IN non-profit named a 25-year-old woman and former META project manager as its next leader, and is focusing efforts on pushing back against the “tradwife” and manosphere movements. The organization has also trimmed about 25% of its staff.
ALSO: Recurring unemployment claims fell to their lowest number since May 2024, coming down from a large boom last year. Then again, at some point, unemployment benefits expire after a certain number of weeks for folks, too.
HUH: This Axios look at how more women are employed in the U.S. than men, and the changes over time, was pretty fascinating. February marked just the 3rd time this has happened — the other 2 were the Great Recession and deep Covid.
Essentially, the vast majority of new job creation is in healthcare, a field that is female-dominated overall.
OH: If you want to do your HULU’s All’s Fair re-enactment, but this time wearing Kim K’s wardrobe — she’s auctioning it off to benefit the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles, which will get 100% of net sales to fund their free legal services for women
THEN: Here’s the mid-April SNL lineup:
WAKEUP BOX OFFICE POLL
I’m going with vox populi this week. WB/NLC They Will Kill You’s reviews seem pretty good . . . but that Ready or Not proximity is real.
So is the AMAZON Project Hail Mary momentum.
NEW POD
🎥 THE SILVER SCREEN
