Transcript: Studios, Strikers and a Tense Game of Chicken

The train wreck if the shutdown goes into 2024 as threatened

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Sean McNulty (00:04):

Hey everybody. Welcome to The Ankler Podcast. This is Sean McNulty from The Wakeup newsletter here at The Ankler on Thursday, July 27th, back here in New York City. Joined of course by Elaine Low, who as always is in Los Angeles. Elaine, fresh from a strike line, it looks like. No, you look great, but it looks like you've been in some L.A. heat there a little bit this morning. Is that accurate?

Elaine Low (00:26):

Yeah, heat stroke adjacent right now, and it's only 10:00 AM.

Sean McNulty (00:30):

All right. And a very tan Richard Rushfield from Los Angeles. Richard, I'm loving the tan look here. I don't know what you're doing, but it's working for you.

Richard Rushfield (00:39):

Back from summer in Spain.

Sean McNulty (00:41):

That'll do it.

Richard Rushfield (00:42):

Faded from a deep burn to very soothing tan.

Elaine Low (00:49):

Nice burnt sienna.

Sean McNulty (00:50):

Yeah, nice Hollywood executive level burnt sienna. It's very nice, Richard.

Richard Rushfield (00:54):

It doesn't hurt to speak anymore, so ...

Sean McNulty (00:57):

Always a plus on a podcast. And joining today, new contributing editor here at The Ankler and former office cubicle mate of Elaine Low. Woo, Claire Atkinson.

Claire Atkinson (01:08):

Hi, everybody.

Sean McNulty (01:09):

Hey Claire. No inside jokes between the two of you today, by the way, all right? Just saying-

Claire Atkinson (01:13):

We'll try our best.

Sean McNulty (01:14):

They of course, worked together over at Insider. Claire's also in the newsletter game herself, running a newsletter and podcast empire over at The Media Mix.

Claire Atkinson (01:28):

That is correct, themediamix.substack.com.

Sean McNulty (01:28):

There you go. There's the address. Definitely recommend signing up for Claire's missives. As always, before we dive in, you can follow The Ankler on all social platforms at The Ankler. Subscribe to The Ankler at theankler.com to get the full suite of newsletters and podcasts, including all of Richard's missives, my missives, Claire's work over here at The Ankler, and of course, Elaine's as well. And also get more of Elaine over at The Ankler's Strikegeist newsletter, totally free at strikegeist.com, for all things strike related. Nothing to do with sweating on the picket lines, although maybe a little bit, Elaine.

Elaine Low (01:58):

I actually will have some advice for avoiding heat stroke from one helpful cooling station captain today.

Sean McNulty (02:06):

Very nice. All right. Get all that and more. Let's just say that over at strikegeist.com. My head's been buried deep in earnings reports all week in earnings calls. So I'm going to hand the mic over to Elaine this week to lead the conversation. Elaine, it's all yours.

Elaine Low (02:22):

Oh, excellent. All right. I get to dominate the mic this week. Hi, everyone. Would love to start off with Richard's column, Fluke in the Ointment, of course, about Barbie and Barbenheimer. Now, who among us has seen one or both so far?

Richard Rushfield (02:37):

Not me.

Sean McNulty (02:38):

I've seen a lot of marketing for both of them. Does that count or no?

Elaine Low (02:42):

I think we've all been inundated with the Barbie marketing. It's pink everything.

Richard Rushfield (02:47):

I wasn't early as early Barbie adopter, though.

Elaine Low (02:51):

You were.

Richard Rushfield (02:51):

No, I haven't actually seen it.

Elaine Low (02:53):

We all saw you strutting around Comic-Con with your Barbie hat. You were a big hit. And Barbie is a big hit. Over $500 million, globally, over $200 million at the domestic box office. I'd like to take early credit for my ... Sean, you shaking your head?

Sean McNulty (03:08):

Richard's taking credit. You're taking credit. All right guys, what is your [inaudible 00:03:11]

Elaine Low (03:11):

It's on my list. I said it was going to be a big hit, and Richard was like, "It's a wild card." And I said, "That's going to be a big hit."

Sean McNulty (03:17):

All right, again. All right, flash. We're getting back to your-

Elaine Low (03:19):

One out of three ain't bad. One out three ain't bad.

Sean McNulty (03:22):

The Hollywood ratio. Yes, exactly. But definitely dominating the talk this week for sure.

Elaine Low (03:26):

Richard, what does this say about the movie industry? What big things can we extrapolate from this?