Once Warner Bros. Discovery officially splits into Warner Bros. and Discovery, the studio business led by CEO David Zaslav will have a new CFO to manage all its financials. The company says that Brad Singer will join the company as CFO of Warner Bros. in connection with the split. He will join in October in a strategic advisor role, and...

Apple TV+s The Studio and a new HBO series from Larry David headline the first round of subsidies to Hollywood after Californias historic expansion of the states entertainment tax credit program, designed to woo productions back to their cultural home. In total, 22 TV productions will get $256 million in incentives for shooting in California, the film commission announced on...

Mr. X co-founder Dennis Berardi has got back the rights to his former company name, allowing a rebrand of his current visual effects house, Herne Hill Media, in time for the Toronto Film Festival. That follows Technicolor in 2014 acquiring Mr. X and pairing theVFXhouse with Motion Picture Company, which had a global reach with offices around the world, including...

Say Technicolor and it likely conjures up a gauzy Wizard of Oz, Golden Age Hollywood glow black-and-white turned rich, full spectrum picture created by the leap-forward color processing advances made nearly a century ago. The image of that brand, a once ubiquitous Hollywood institution that billed itself as The Greatest Name in Color or World Favorite In Motion Pictures and...

Long-time Paramount communications executive David Bittler is departing the company. Bittler has been with Paramount (and its forerunner Viacom) for some 25 years, most recently as executive vp communications for the companys kids and family division, including Nickelodeon, Awesomeness and kids and family series at Paramount+. He also spent time at MTV Networks and helped launch Logo, the first ad-supported...

Fanatics, the Michael Rubin-led company at the heart of the sports commerce, collectibles, gaming and events space, is pushing into a lucrative new line of business: Sports advertising. The company on Tuesday announced the launch of a new division, Fanatics Advertising, which is being led by Jeremi Gorman, the former head of ad sales for Netflix and Snap. Gorman initially...

Peter Friedlander, head of U.S. and Canada scripted series at Netflix, is leaving the streamer after 14 years. Jinny Howe will move up to take his place leading the division. Friedlander is one of Netflixs longest-serving creative executives, having joined the company in 2011. That was right around when Netflix announced its first foray into original series with House of...

Mamma Mia! hit $1.78 million last week as the revival continues to pull in Broadway audiences 10 years after its original run. The musical brought in the tally in its first full week post-opening that included three press performances with some comped tickets. The show opened Aug. 14 and continues to play to 100 percent capacity.This was the highest grossing...

Anthropic has settled a lawsuit from authors, who accused the Amazon-backed company of illegally downloading and copying their books to teach its AI system, in among the first deals reached by creators over novel legal issues raised by the technology. This historic settlement will benefit all class members, says Justin Nelson, a lawyer for the authors. We look forward to...

YouTube has now spent half a year as the leading company in share of TV viewing in the United States and its lead grew in July. The streamer had 13.4 percent of all TV use for the month, according to Nielsens Media Distributor Gauge for the July period (which covered June 30-July 27). It held a four-point lead over second-place...

Charlie Ergens telecom giant EchoStar unveiled a definitive agreement with ATT to sell spectrum licenses for approximately$23 billion. The company said on Tuesday that the deal covers a total of 50 MHz of nationwide spectrum, including 3.45 GHz and 600 MHz spectrum, subject to regulatory approval. In addition, the companies have amended their network services agreement to create a hybrid...

A little known fact about movie and TV show purchases online: Whats being bought isnt actually ownership of the title but rather a limited-time license for viewing access. Consider the $4.99 directors cut of Alien on Amazon Prime Video. Cheap, right? But if the tech giant loses the rights to that version, the movie can be replaced with a different...

Netflix is getting into the baseball business, inking a streaming deal for the 2026 World Baseball Classic. The catch? The streaming giant is only picking up the rights for Japan. The World Baseball Classic is owned by Major League Baseball (via World Baseball Classic Inc.), which operates it alongside the MLB Players Association, and sees national teams face off in...