Showbiz Sandbox 403: Justice Department Makes Its Case Against AT&T-Time Warner Merger
March 12, 2018
As the Department of Justice prepares for its antitrust trial to prevent the merger of AT&T and Time Warner, they are submitted a brief to the court claiming the outcome of the case shape how video-content is delivered in the United States for years to come. They believe the merger will stifle competition, prevent competitors from entering the market and ultimately disadvantage consumers. If the government succeeds in court, could they go after Comcast NBCUniversal next?
Meanwhile, even though the Academy Awards were last week, Academy Award preferential balloting, there is still some debate over the preferential balloting system used to select Best Picture. Does the method lead to a consensus choice rather than the film most people voted for in the first place? Certainly, complaints about Best Picture winners are not new, nor is preferential balloting, which was first used at the Oscars n 1934.
The Fox television network plans on cutting advertising on its primetime lineup down to two minutes per hour by 2020. This comes as NBC and CBS recently announced similar ad-limiting initiatives. Why are TV networks suddenly so keen to dump their lucrative advertising and how will they make up that lost revenue?
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news including how “Hamilton” has conquered the West End in London, e-sports turns into a billion dollar business and Facebook will broadcast Major League Baseball games this season.
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Showbiz Sandbox 402: How the 90th Annual Oscars Took Shape
March 5, 2018
The 90th Academy Awards went down pretty much as everyone expected it would. After a lengthy awards season there were few surprises over who would go home with Oscars. There were no upsets (or mistakes) when it came time to announce Best Picture, as Guillermo del Toro’s “The Shape of Water” won the honor.
During a year which saw the rise of the #MeeToo movement, the vociferous calls from the Oscar stage for gender inclusion and racial diversity within the motion picture industry were also highly anticipated. Anne Thompson, Indiewire’s editor-at-large, was backstage during the ceremony and she joins us to share her insights about.
Meanwhile, though Comcast may have been turned down by 20th Century Fox, the cable giant hasn’t given up on growing its conglomerate through acquisitions. Last week they made a $31 billion offer to buy Europe’s Sky Broadcasting, something Fox has been struggling to do for some time now.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news including how Spotify is finally going public, the Swiss back public broadcasting and why YouTube is punishing a prominent conservative conspiracy theorist.
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Showbiz Sandbox 401: Redbox Beats Disney At Their Own Copyright Game
February 26, 2018
In the first round of a copyright infringement lawsuit, Disney failed to win an injunction preventing the DVD rental company Redbox from selling digital copies of its films. Instead, a judge ruled that since Redbox is forced to buy retail copies of Disney films, they have the right to sell the digital copy that accompanies each disc. To make matters worse, the federal court faulted Disney for copyright misuse, making the studio vulnerable to an existing countersuit filed by Redbox.
While Disney and Redbox duke it out in court over copyright issues, the cinema-going subscription company MoviePass is suing an upstart competitor named Sinemia over patent infringement while at the same time trying to straighten out its customer service.
In China the Lunar New Year closed out by bringing in $500 million at the box office, the highest weekend tally ever recorded in a single market. In total, the country took in whopping $901 million during the Spring Festival.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news including why actor Brendan Fraser disappeared from Hollywood, The Weinstein Company is forced into bankruptcy and Netflix debuts its first Arabic content.
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Showbiz Sandbox 400: The Long, Slow Death of Barnes & Noble
February 19, 2018
As Barnes & Noble loses an ever increasing number of customers to Amazon, the largest bookstore chain in the United States continues struggles to remain a viable business, if not relevant. Now comes word the retailer has cut 1,800 workers representing all of its full-time in-store staff. Should this last ditch effort to stay in business fails, the publishing industry is in for a world of hurt.
Meanwhile, “Black Panther” roared into theaters, shattering records as it came out on top of this week’s worldwide box office, despite Chinese New Year releases earning over half a billion dollars. Will the success of a big budget movie with a minority cast change the culture of Hollywood and the kinds of projects it chooses to make?
The BAFTA Awards were held on Sunday, reinforcing what everyone is saying about this year’s Oscar race: the acting categories look to be locked in stone, but Best Picture is still up for grabs.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news with special guest Karen Woodward, including television producer Ryan Murphy’s rich deal at Netflix, musician Justin Timberlake’s upcoming tour is a huge hit even before tickets go on sale and why MoviePass is in the news yet again.
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Showbiz Sandbox 399: Why Can’t Hulu and Spotify Turn A Profit?
February 12, 2018
As consumers abandon physical media like compact discs and DVDs they are signing up for streaming services like Hulu and Spotify by the tens of millions. Even so, profitability has proven elusive for such companies. We’ll try and understand why, despite all their earnings and tons of headlines, such services continue to be in the red.
Meanwhile the movie awards season has reached a fever pitch, with the Writers Guild handing out their top awards to “Call Me By Your Name” and “Get Out.” Could the horror flick be gaining momentum in the Oscar race just like “Moonlight” did last year?
The Grammys may be over but Michael Giltz just finished his list of the best albums of 2017. Oce you move beyond the big prize for Album Of The Year, his picks have a lot in common with the winners at this year’s ceremony.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news including why Russia has launched a smear campaign against an Oscar nominated documentary, a hiccup in the sale of The Weinstein Company and a respected television executive gets picked to head up Amazon Studios.
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Showbiz Sandbox 398: Streaming Services Crowd The Field During Super Bowl
February 5, 2018
The ratings for this year’s Super Bowl may have declined 7% and we might know why. After all, there were ads for Hulu, Netflix movies like “The Cloverfield Paradox,” Amazon Prime’s Jack Ryan series and even a few movies that might appear in theatres later this year. Oh, there was also a pretty good football game that came down to the last play.
The big game usually puts a damper on the box office in North America, but it certainly doesn’t help when new releases can’t hold their own against titles that opened in December. Even so, international grosses are where all the action is these days and over the past week a Bollywood title managed to beat out the latest “Maze Runner” installment in China. We’ll explain why.
Meanwhile, the Oscar race is coming into sharper focus now that the Director’s Guild has handed out their top awards to “The Shape of Water” and “Get Out”. It’s important to remember however, that the preferential ballot has managed to upend the Best Picture category recently.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news including why there is a petition for RIAA president Neil Portnow to resign, compact discs are slowly disappearing from retail outlets and Netflix may team up with Luc Besson.
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Showbiz Sandbox 397: Thompson On The 2018 Oscar Nominations and Sundance Film Festival
January 29, 2018
Some of the biggest annual headline generators in the entertainment industry all happened to occur during the same week this year; the Grammy Awards were handed out, the Oscar Nominations were announced and the Sundance Film Festival came to a close. Anne Thompson, Indiewire’s editor at large, helps us break down the Oscar nominations while also telling us about the titles from Sundance that we can look forward to seeing in the year ahead.
As for the Grammy Awards, though hip-hop albums by Kendrick Lamar and Jay-Z were heavily favored to win top prizes, it was Bruno Mars who took home the nights biggest honors, including Album of the Year. And though the telecast of the ceremony was filled with performances by the biggest names in music, viewership plummeted to an all-time low.
Meanwhile, the movie ticket subscription service MoviePass caused a stir in Hollywood last week, though not necessarily in a good way. The company removed ten high-profile AMC theaters from its service claiming they were tired of being ignored by the cinema chain. But could the real reason be that MoviePass was simply losing too much money at those locations?
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news including why Neil Diamond and Elton John will stop touring, celebrities get caught out paying for social media followers and the story behind an open source, anonymous list of salaries for television writers and producers.
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Showbiz Sandbox 396: Has the #MeToo Movement Pushed Actress Salaries Higher?
January 22, 2018
As Hollywood continues to grapple with how to handle decades of sexual misconduct one immediate benefit for women throughout the industry may come in the form of higher paychecks. Take actress Ellen Pompeo, for instance. The star of “Grey’s Anatomy” for the past 13 years dished the dirt on her contract with ABC and after years of trying to be paid as much as the male leads of the show, she now makes $20 million per season.
Naturally not everyone working in television who is looking to be paid what they are worth, or even what they are owed contractually, is a woman. Frank Darabont, who created the hit series “The Walking Dead” has been suing AMC for years over profit participation in the show he was fired from. Now Darabont is returning to court armed with even more evidence the network tried to hoodwink him.
Meanwhile the awards season plows on with some claiming there are no front runners in the Oscars race. That seems strange when “The Shape of Water” (The Producers Guild) and “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri” (SAG Awards) keep winding up at the top of most lists.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news including why the Huffington Post is saying goodbye to its bloggers, YouTube sets new guidelines for its partner program and MoviePass gets into the film distribution game.
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Showbiz Sandbox 395: The Future of Television Is Now and It’s Online
January 15, 2018
Though the number of pay-TV subscribers grew by 1.2% last year, in mature media markets consumers continue to cut the cord, migrating to over the top (OTT) services provided by an increasing list of streaming services. In fact, Hulu just announced they now have 17 million subscribers for their on-demand and live-TV services. The promise of a future wherein we could watch whatever we want, whenever we want may finally be here. Now all we need is half a dozen streaming subscriptions.
Meanwhile, as the Directors Guild of America and BAFTA announce their nominees for year end honors, the awards season begins to further define some of its frontrunners. Though not always telling of who might wind up on Oscars shortlist, “The Shape of Water” and “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri” continue to rack up the most nods.
And unfortunately cases of sexual misconduct continue to make headlines. The revered French actress Catherine Deneuve joined 100 other women from France to accuse the #metoo movement of having a pack mentality that sometimes mistakes flirting for sexual assault and winds up destroying people’s lives in the process.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news including why YouTube is facing a backlash over a post by one of its popular vloggers, “Modern Family” will end after its tenth season and why Radiohead might be suing Lana Del Rey over copyright infringement. Read more
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Showbiz Sandbox 394: A Golden Globes Ceremony With Perfect Timing
January 8, 2018
Amid a sea of black dresses and black tie Hollywood held its first big annual event of the #metoo age as the Golden Globes became a platform for the industry to speak out on gender inequality. The highlight of the evening came when Oprah Winfrey delivered a rousing acceptance speech for an honorary award that had everyone wondering whether she plans on running for president in 2020.
Meanwhile, estimated financials for 2017 are being tallied and it looks as if the global box office set new highs, thanks in part to the Chinese market which is still rising sharply. In North America however, attendance reached a low that hasn’t been seen in decades generating receipts that declined only slightly.
And just as a new wave of lawsuits threaten to swamp Spotify, the music streaming service looks to cash in with one of the largest direct public offerings ever. Apple music is still trying to catch up to Spotify’s 70 million paying subscribers as Jimmy Iovine, one of their key executives, is reportedly stepping down this summer.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment news including Broadway’s record breaking year, Lady Gaga heads to Las Vegas and John Legend becomes a savior.
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