Showbiz Sandbox 478: Setting Records at Sundance and the Grammys
January 27, 2020
With the Winter Olympics causing an abbreviated and frantic awards season, the film took a brief respite from Oscar-talk to head to Park City, Utah for this year’s Sundance Film Festival. We give you an update on all the hot titles and buzz being generated at this year’s festival, including a record breaking price for a Sundance film.
Meanwhile, the Grammys were held under a scandalous cloud due to the fallout from the Recording Academy dismissing its top exec, Deborah Dugan. The evening belonged to 18-year-old Billie Eilish who became the youngest person to win four of the top awards at the event including Best Pop Vocal Album, Best New Artist, Record of the Year, Song of the Year and Album of the Year.
In China, the Chinese New Year usually marks the highest grossing week on the calendar, however not this year. A highly contagious virus caused the government to quarantine large cities and the country’s cinema chains shuttered out of precaution leading to a loss of hundreds of millions yuan.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including why country radio stations won’t play female artists, more talent agencies sign on to the Writers Guild code of conduct, and Netflix continues to gain subscribers.
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Showbiz Sandbox 474: YouTube and Facebook Curtail Their Streaming Subscriptions
December 30, 2019
Facebook and YouTube might be giants in technology and media, but they have both decided to sit out the streaming wars. Sure, they’re spending $1 billion per year producing original content but pales in comparison to what the Apples and Amazons and Peacocks and HBO Maxes of the world are shelling out for new content. So, Facebook and YouTube have decided to keep their video offerings free and ad-supported.
As 2019 comes to a close with one of the biggest movie-going weeks of the year it looks as if the industry will end a semi-happy note, with record international box office, perhaps a new worldwide box office record and the second biggest North American haul in history.
Meanwhile, China added another 8,800 movie screens this year, bringing the country’s grand total to a titch under 69,000 in all. And most of the hits playing on those screens are Chinese films and that’s just the way the government wants to keep it.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including why Universal Pictures may have released a new version of “Cats” after it was already in theaters, live news and sports dominates the year’s basic cable ratings and Spotify gets out of politcs.
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Showbiz Sandbox 470: The End of the Paramount Consent Decree
December 1, 2019
The Department of Justice has announced their intention to jettison the Paramount Consent Decree, the agreement that ended the studio system and under which the film industry has operated for the past 70 years. What will this mean for movie theater operators moving forward? Now that studios have become big media conglomerates will they behave anti-competitively?
Speaking of agreements, more mid-level talent agencies have signed the Writers Guild of America’s code of conduct. In the process, these agencies have gotten the WGA to agree not to enforce the ban on television packaging until one of four major firms signs on.
Meanwhile, the Thanksgiving holiday weekend was once again a time for audiences to return to cinemas en masse. However this year instead of going to see the latest blockbuster sequel, moviegoers actually sought out original films.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including the Grammy nominations, why Netflix bought a movie theater in New York City and the controversy over the firing of Gabrielle Union from “America’s Got Talent.”
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Showbiz Sandbox 464: Warner Bros. Gets the Last Laugh With “Joker”
October 7, 2019
After winning the top prize at the Venice Film Festival last month, “Joker” shattered October box office records around the world. This was despite mixed critical reviews and concerns about violence that led to heightened security at movie theaters. The question remains whether the movie will be too dark for Oscar voters come awards season.
The box office in China also made headlines over the past week as the country celebrated National Day by heading to the movies. China’s biggest release for the holiday week even made it onto the North American box office charts.
Meanwhile, one of Hollywood’s biggest talent agencies was hoping to raise a lot of money by going public and ultimately change how agents do business. However, Endeavor wound up pulling its initial public offering at the last minute as market makers began raising doubts.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including how who will be performing at next year’s Super Bowl Halftime Show, Spider-Man rejoins Marvel’s Cinematic Universe and Apple will release (some of) its movies in theatres with a 90-day theatrical window.
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Showbiz Sandbox 460: Spider-Man Exits The Marvel Cinematic Universe
September 2, 2019
The big-time Hollywood divorce that has the entertainment industry buzzing this summer is the acrimonious split between Sony Pictures and Walt Disney Studios over custody of the most popular character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe; Spider-Man. The agreement that allowed Sony to loan out the character for Disney’s Avenger films was unprecedented. But after Disney asked to share in the financing and profit of future Spidey films, Sony opted out of the relationship.
The latest Spider-Man movie was one of the biggest hits of the summer, though box office for the season was actually down. One might think that’s why AMC Cinemas is planning to experiment with dynamically pricing movie tickets, but actually it’s really because they just want to charge more for popular films.
Meanwhile, streaming giants like Netflix are premiering some of their high profile movies at the biggest fall film festivals just in time to kick off awards season. They even plan to show them in cinemas before allowing them to be streamed on their platform. Now all Netflix has to do is convince cinema chains to book them.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including why Eminem is suing Spotify, the Writers Guild takes its case against talent agents to federal court and why Taylor Swift wants to record all her old albums over again.
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Showbiz Sandbox 458: The Number of Music Copyright Lawsuits Is Sure To Increase
August 12, 2019
Are musicians ripping each other off more than ever? Accusations of plagiarism have been around a long time, but they exploded after musician Robin Thicke was successfully sued over lifting his song “Blurred Lines” from Marvin Gaye’s “Got To Give It Up.” Just ask Katy Perry who recently lost a similar lawsuit over her hit single “Dark Horse.”
Before that case, most legal experts said you needed specific lyrics or main melodies to constitute stealing. Now the courts have decided that beats and even the vague “feel” or “vibe” of a song can be copyrightable.
Meanwhile, Netflix lost subscribers for the first time since 2011 and you’d think the sky was falling. What with new competition from Disney, Warner Bros. and Apple about to launch, there are plenty of doomsayers prognosticating the demise of the streaming giant.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including “Doctor Who” heads to HBO Max, why Chinese studios are boycotting Asia’s most important movie awards show and two of Hollywood’s biggest public relations firm announced a merger.
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Showbiz Sandbox 454: Summer Box Office Is Heating Up
July 8, 2019
It was the Fourth of July in the United States which is often a slow news time for the entertainment industry. Except for when it comes to the box office which looks to finally be picking up slightly thanks to sequels such as “Toy Story 4” and “Spider-Man: Far from Home.” Though the box office continues to trail behind last year’s record-breaking tally there are still plenty of big releases to come.
That includes at least one more live-action remake of a classic Disney film; “The Lion King.” That will be the third such Disney release this year. Is the company saturating the market with live-action remakes of its own classic films?
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including why Lionsgate is slowing down its theme park plans, Mad Magazine will stop being published and Rolling Stone launches its own music charts.
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Showbiz Sandbox 446: How the B-Team Grew Into the Marvel Cinematic Universe
April 29, 2019
When Kevin Feige, the President of Marvel Studios, set out to launch a movie franchise based on the company’s comic books he hired an erratic actor with a history of drug addiction to play a superhero hardly anybody knew and a director whose last film bombed. At the time, Geoff Boucher, now the genre editor of Deadline, wrote an article headlined “Here Comes The B-Team”.
Well, 12 years and over 22 films later the Marvel Cinematic Universe has become a $20 billion franchise whose latest entrant, “Avengers: Endgame,” made $1.2 billion in its open week. Boucher joins us to discuss how Feige managed to oversee one of the most profitable movie properties of all time.
Meanwhile, the Writers Guild is nowhere near reaching an accord with the Association of Talent Agents over packaging fees. Even some of the smaller agencies, who don’t package television series and don’t have affiliated production companies, are unwilling to sign the proposed code of conduct.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including the moviegoing subscription service Sinemia shuts down, the Chinese government grows a little wary of the TV smash hit “The Story Of Yanxi Palace” and Steven Spielberg doesn’t actually hate Netflix.
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Showbiz Sandbox 444: Disney Gets Serious About Streaming
April 15, 2019
From the moment the Walt Disney Company announced they would eventually launch their own video streaming service everyone wanted more detailed information. When would the service launch? How much would it cost? What content would be offered? Last week Disney answered all of those questions during an investor media event.
Disney+, as the service has been named, will launch this November in and will offer hundreds of hours of television and movies, both old and new, for the attractive price of $6.99 per month or $70 per year. Unlike Apple, who announced their own streaming service just a few weeks ago, Disney proved they know how to launch an attractive content platform. Not surprising since they have content from their animation, Marvel and Lucasfilm labels to offer up.
Meanwhile, the Writers Guild of America and the talent agents which represent their membership, are still arguing over the adoption of a new code of conduct which would prevent agencies from collecting packaging fees on new television series. Late last week the WGA asked its members to fire their agents, which many did rather publicly via social media.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including how Apple Music has topped Spotify (in the United States), the Emmys revise how certain TV shows are classified and Netflix buys a movie theater.
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Showbiz Sandbox 441: Music Industry Gets Into The Stream of Things
March 18, 2019
In February the RIAA reported that music sales in the United States reached $9.8 billion in 2018, up nearly 12% over the previous year. Total worldwide sales were up over 13% reaching $18.9 billion. What’s remarkable is of that figure $9.6 billion, or 51%, came from streaming revenue, the first time that figure has outpaced digital and physical sales.
While some might see this as just a bunch of numbers and sales figures, labels and artists are beginning to see more revenue from streaming. In fact, musicians selling directly to fans grew 35% last year, topping out at $643 million, none of which went to record labels or middlemen.
Meanwhile, “Captain Marvel” continues to top the box office and looks to be headed toward $1 billion with the release of “Avengers: End Game” just a month or so behind. In China, the Oscar winning “Green Book” is doing surprisingly well.
Of course we also cover the week’s top entertainment headlines including the head of Warner Bros. resigns amid a sexual misconduct scandal, Netflix cancels “One Day At A Time” and MySpace loses it’s music (or at least some of it) .
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