On today’s episode, Variety box office chief Rebecca Rubin explains the weak starts for “Him” and “A Big Bold Beautiful Journey,” and why Taylor Swift is a friend to exhibition. Brian Steinberg, Variety’s senior TV editor, breaks down the five-way brawl among Jimmy Kimmel, Disney, the FCC, Nexstar and Sinclair.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Daily Variety, your daily dose of news and
analysis for entertainment industry insiders. It's Monday, September twenty second,
twenty twenty five. I'm your host, Cynthia Littleton. I am
co editor in chief of Variety alongside Ramin Setuda. I'm
in LA He's in New York, and Vardy has reporters
around the world covering the business of entertainment. In today's episode,
(00:22):
we'll talk with Friday's box office chief Rebecca Rubin about
week starts at the multiplexes for him and a big, bold,
beautiful journey as Demon slayer Infinity Castle keeps its grip
on Number one, and Senior TV editor Brian Steinberg brings
us up to speed on the big story in Hollywood,
(00:42):
Disney's benching of Jimmy Kimmel. But before we get to that,
here are a few headlines just in this morning that
you need to know. Spider Man star Tom Hollands suffered
a mild concussion on the set of Spider Man Brand
New Day. He's expected back at work in a few days.
Cassavetes has signed on to direct the US remake of
(01:03):
The Boy with Pink Pants, the young adult movie with
a strong anti bullying message was a big hit in
Italy for Eagle Pictures. Eddie Redmain's Day of the Jackal
series has hired a new writer for season two. David
Harrower has stepped in as creator Ronan Bennett steps back.
The thriller airs on Peacock and Sky. My colleague Alex
(01:25):
Ripman in London has the scoop. You can read that
story and so much more on Variety dot Com Right now.
Now we turn to conversations with Variety journalists about news
and trends in show business. If it's Monday, we're talking
box office with Rebecca Rubin, our senior film and media reporter.
(01:47):
Rebecca breaks down the weekend results and she points to
beacons on the horizon for the box office in the
shape of Leonardo DiCaprio and Taylor Swift. Rebecca Rubins, thank
you so much for joining me. Thanks for having me. Rebecca,
tell us what's going on out there? How did the
big openers this weekend do? After two really.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Strong back to back weekends in September with the Latest
Conjuring movie and The Demon's Layer, this was a pretty
soft weekend at the box office. There were two new
movies that opened Him, which is a sports thriller that
was produced by Jordan Peel, and then A Big, Bold,
Beautiful Journey, which is a romantic drama with Marco Robbie
(02:31):
and Colin Ferrell, and neither of those movies really ignited
the box office in a meaningful way.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
Do you think it's just movie going, Is it's a
typical lull, or do you think that it was a
lackluster product this weekend kept the lid on receipts.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
I would say it's probably the latter. I think that
it was a lackluster weekend in terms of new releases,
because we've seen in September, if people want to come
out to see a movie, even if it's not something
that's on most of Hollywood's radar, audiences can come out
in huge numbers whatever the weekend is. In this case,
I think the two new releases just did not have
(03:11):
the reviews or the word of mouth to get people talking.
Him had a twenty eight percent on Rotten Tomatoes, which
is quite a negative aggregate score, and A Big, Bold,
Beautiful Journey, beyond it being a bit of a tongue twister,
also had similarly negative reviews and word of mouth from
(03:31):
audiences for.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
A big, bold, beautiful journey. You had Margot Robbie, you
had Colin Farrell finally after we finally got to look
at Colin Farrell again without all that penguin makeup.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
But it also.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Seems like the kind of movie, you know, an adult
drama that you just don't see at the multiplexes as much.
What audience do you think the distributor was going for
with this movie?
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Sony actually pos positioned this movie. I remember vividly when
they announced it as a female event picture in the
vein of It Ends with Us, which was the Blake
Lively Justin Baldoni movie that, despite all the controversy, was
a huge box office success, and so they were very
(04:18):
clearly saying, here we are going after this underserved female
audience to call it a female event picture. I had
not seen that verbiage before, and so they were being
very declarative on who they were trying to get with
this movie. And like you said, it's not really the
type of movie that we see succeeding in movie theaters anymore.
(04:42):
We've seen movies from other genres succeed despite the odds,
but typically when they are succeeding despite the odds they
have behind them, the great reviews, the word of mouth,
and I think this movie just misfired on the execution.
And so if you already have a movie that critics
and audiences don't like, it's that much harder to get
them to pay money to go see it.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
How has the whole been for Demon's Layer and for
conjuring the movies that did light up a September box office.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
Demon's Layer was the number one movie again at the
North American and the International box office, and in North
America it made seventeen point three million dollars, so it
had a pretty significant seventy five percent decline from its
opening weekend, which of course set a record for anime
film grossing seventy million. And so that is a pretty
(05:35):
brutal decline. But if you are just looking at it
from a numbers perspective, seventeen million dollars for an anime
film would have been impressive in the film's first weekend.
So the fact that it made that much in its
second weekend, and this movie has already grossed over one
hundred million dollars in North America speaks to the enthusiasm
for it, and so it was on par kind of
(05:58):
with expectations that it would have a big drop, but
it still is raking in significant money.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
So there was good news for Sony this weekend as well.
How about Conjuring.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Conjuring as well had a pretty good third weekend. This
is its third weekend of release and it made thirteen
million dollars. And with this weekend's total, Conjuring last Rites,
which is I think it's the fourth Conjuring movie and
the eight, the ninth and the overall franchise, it is
now the highest grossing of the franchise with over one
(06:30):
hundred and fifty million domestically and four hundred million globally.
And this movie actually is continuing a stellar run, not
just for Warner Brothers, but New Line, which is a
subsidiary of Warner Brothers, and New Line with this movie
now has crossed the billion dollar mark just in twenty
twenty five, and that is mostly thanks to horror hits
(06:53):
like Final Destination, Bloodlines, Weapons, and so Newline is really
cleaning up this year with horror movies that are getting
audiences to turn out in droves.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
I could make a lot of cheap joke about horror
and the time that we are living in. But I'm
just gonna leave it at that. What should we look
forward to in the coming weeks of the box office?
What are exhibitors excited about?
Speaker 2 (07:15):
So if you asked anybody a few months ago, they
would probably say that Paul Thomas Anderson's new movie, One
Battle after Another, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, is a huge risk,
and it still is because it cost one hundred and
thirty million dollars to produce, or more, depending on who
you ask. But Warner Brothers has as well been on
(07:36):
this epic box office streak and all of these movies
that people were not expecting to be massive successes have
become just that, And so nobody wants to bet against
Warner Brothers at this point. And there's a chance that
One Battle after Another, which has been pretty rapturously reviewed,
could become another commercial win for Warner Brothers. That would
(07:56):
be very exciting to see because it's targeting more of
an adult audience and that is also a demographic that
is not as catered to as the box office. Another
movie that exhibitors are quite excited about is Taylor Swift's
newly announced The release party of a Showgirl, and of
course that is tied to her new album that is
(08:17):
coming out in October. And she has been a big
supporter of theatrical with her concert film that was released
in twenty twenty three. And so no matter what this
movie does, it's not gonna make the business that the
concert film did because it's a very different project. But
any money that this movie makes is just crazy that
(08:37):
they were not expecting even a few weeks ago.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
Taylor Swift is the gift that keeps on giving to
all media. And I'm so glad you mentioned one battle
after another because, dear listeners, you're gonna hear from Owen Gleiberman,
Variety's chief film critic, on this film in Tuesday's episode.
So thank you for teasing that, Rebecca, and as always,
thank you for your insights.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Thanks for having me, and I will be eager to
see how one about after another doesn't.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
And now we'll hear from Brian Steinberg on the latest
industry conflagration that has protesters lining up outside of Disney offices.
As I record this Monday morning, Jimmy Kimmel is still
on indefinite suspension from his late night show at ABC.
It's not canceled, but we don't know when he'll be
back either. Brian Steinberg, thanks for joining me.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
Glad to be here.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
You and others at Bridy have been busy on the
Jimmy kimmelbat ever since this story really blew up Wednesday
afternoon when Disney made the decision to pull him off
the air abruptly. So a lot has transpired between then
and now that we are talking. Where do you think
things stand right now in terms of the decision making
(09:53):
process for ABC and for Team Kimmel.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
I think it's a genuine effort theado to one and
a half and come back on the air. This is
a longtime employee of Disney. He's been doing this for
more than two decades. He's been ambassador for ABC and
the company hosting the Oscars other projects. Who wants to
be a millionaire?
Speaker 1 (10:15):
So, in terms of how things went down, Brendan Carr,
the head of the FCC, goes on Benny Johnson's podcast
and makes what sure sounds like a threat against ABC
about very upset about Kimmel's comments, which had gotten a
lot of backlash that day from people in certainly and
conservative and Maga media circles. Hours later, you have Next Star,
(10:36):
the single biggest owner of TV stations, saying our thirty
two ABC affiliate stations will not air Jimmy Kimmel. That's
a significant blow to his distribution in addition to a
bad blow to the pr And then minutes after that
came Sinclair, another huge station owner, saying the same thing
and asking for even more wildly unrealistic things for a
(10:58):
TV station group to ask of talent. Let me ask you, Brian,
does ABC pull him just on Brendan Carr's comments or
what was he pulled? Because Next Star in Sinclair said
we are yanking our stations.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
I have to imagine because of the Sinclair and Next Star.
Next Star is a large maybe even soon to be
larger station owner. Those are stations in New Orleans, Salt
Lake City, Nashville, places that kim on needs to reach
and kim O will do well in LA and New
York because that's the but you need to reach people
in the New South, the Midwest. Those stations are important
(11:33):
to the overall distribution of the show. Without that, then
often the rains go down. Then you have talked to
advertiser about why the rains are gone down what they're
paying for, and they pay for the guarantees even promised
by ABC. I think you know that's a problematic situation
you're in now. Can they get around it? Can they
go to put them on Hulu or Disney Plus and
get around that situation and do some ad deals.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Disney has plenty of platforms to get kim all out,
but the strength of podcast TV, and you wonder if
something prolonged like this could really continue to chip away
of the classic network affiliate relationship with Jimmy Kimmelflapp is
coming at a time when there's been simmering tensions with
the networks over how much the station groups pay the
(12:16):
networks to help the networks pay for pricey things like
football and big events. And this is obviously happening at
a time when traditional late night TV does not have
the pull it did even recently.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
Yeah, I think what's happening late night is the fragmentation
has heard it when David Letterman announced He's going to
retire a lot of folks to try to throw Spagetio
walls they can get their own share of the late
night audience. For a while, we had like MTV tried
their hand add a national geographic the science late night show.
Now you have a late night hosts now have to
(12:49):
go for a base rather than for everybody. Johnny Carson
had the whole nation watching him and our current but
of late night hosts are doing political humor to get
a lot of the success of their show these days
depends on how many YouTube hits they get an X
pass along and viral hits. And to do that, you
need to talk about do hot talk politics barbs, you know,
(13:10):
really kind of sometimes something I think a previous generation
like Arseneo Hall or Pat Sajad or Johnny Carson or
Tom Snyder would not do because they had a much
broader crowd watching every night and they had me mindful
of that. So the economics are weaker because the hosts
now have niches rather than the whole world.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Washington, do you think this gets resolved? Middle of this week? Like?
How much longer can this impass go on?
Speaker 3 (13:34):
We're the start of a brand new TV season. You
want Kimmel on the air for ABC? You would that
audience gathering at night? You've fallen back to Good Morning
America in the morning, Disney is a pillar of the
creative community in Hollywood, and a lot of people who
are actors, directors, producers are gas and a decision to
pull them off the air like this could they have
had to come on and explain himself in a way
(13:56):
that everyone can agree upon. The longer he's off, the
more this investers would Justy's base. It's employees, it's creative community.
People who work for them in movies and TV shows
and other things also come ticked off. I mean Bob
igeran Dana Walden have taken a thorny path. It is
difficult see how they they will please everybody. They may
(14:17):
have to, you know, they are business concerns, there are
creative concerns. Hollywood's watching, Washington is watching. It's difficult.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
It's a diplomatic mission, it's a business mission, and with
all things Disney, it's often inefficiable. And of course the
people that you mentioned, Bob Iger, Dana Walden, there's a
lot of scrutiny on them because there is a transition
coming for Disney in the leadership ranks. They have promised
that there will be a transition sometime in the early
part of twenty twenty six, so there's never a good
(14:45):
time for a crisis, but this would probably be a
particularly bad time for everything going on. Well, it'll be
very interesting to watch what comes Monday and beyond. Brian,
thank you for working hard to cover this. Thank you.
Let's give the last word on this segment to John Oliver,
the host of HBO's Last Week Tonight, makes a great
point about whether Next Star and Sinclair really qualify as
(15:09):
local broadcasters given their size and scope and the level
of their activity before the FCC. Here's a clip from
Sunday Nights episode.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
Well, but more than that, Claiming this is simply local
broadcasters responding to their community values is pretty hard to take.
And that this wasn't a bunch of independent stations taking
a standard. Was two of the biggest local TV ownership
groups in the country making sweeping decisions for all the
affiliates they owned. Calling these companies local broadcasters is like
(15:39):
describing Coca Cola as a neighborhood soda shop or Boeing
as a mom and pop plane crash business. It makes
no sense. Look, the sequence of events here could not
be clearer because it was all done in playing view.
Car leaned on broadcasters to take down Kimmel. They did that,
sometimes even directly so in car while doing so, and
(16:02):
that car celebrated with a fun gift. That sure seems
like a pretty clear case of the government pressuring companies.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
Two cents of speaking, as we close out today's episode,
the only certainty we have about this week is that
there will be a lot of news. We are waiting
for news on the Jimmy Kimmel front. We are waiting
for news around Warner Brothers, Discovery and what's going on
with that bidding process. But I wanted to share a
(16:30):
few thoughts from my weekend in San Diego. I attended
the Proximo conference, focused on Latino entrepreneurs and business growth.
It's always interesting to talk to people who work in
other sectors about business issues, headwinds, opportunities. It was a
great mix of people in San Diego. I'm so grateful
(16:50):
to conference organizer Nelli Galan for inviting me. I'm grateful
also to my panelist who delivered great conversations, producer Alexis Garcia,
Hurst Media's Angelica Rossas McDaniels, and Nueva Network's Renee Allegria.
I was also honored to meet the great author Sandra Cisneros.
Without question, every business conference should close out with a
(17:14):
dance party. At the end of the tribute to Cisneros
on Saturday night, the tables were empty, the dance floor
was packed, and it was joyous before we go. Congrats
to Ian Holder and Tariq Stewart. They've just been named
senior vice presidents of A and R for Capitol Records,
(17:34):
overseeing the company's urban A and R team. Holder comes
to Capital from Sony Music Publishing. Stewart was with RCAA Records.
Thanks for listening. This episode was written and reported by
me Cynthia Littleton, with contributions from Rebecca Rubin and Brian Steinberg.
Special thanks to restaurant Cocinas del Monte in San Diego
(17:56):
for not throwing me out while I recorded the box
office segment before I hopped on a bus back to
l A stick snickt hick picks. Please leave us a
review at the podcast platform of your choice, and please
tune in tomorrow for another episode of Daily Variety.
Welcome to Daily Variety, your daily dose of news and
analysis for entertainment industry insiders. It's Monday, September twenty second,
twenty twenty five. I'm your host, Cynthia Littleton. I am
co editor in chief of Variety alongside Ramin Setuda. I'm
in LA He's in New York, and Vardy has reporters
around the world covering the business of entertainment. In today's episode,
(00:22):
we'll talk with Friday's box office chief Rebecca Rubin about
week starts at the multiplexes for him and a big, bold,
beautiful journey as Demon slayer Infinity Castle keeps its grip
on Number one, and Senior TV editor Brian Steinberg brings
us up to speed on the big story in Hollywood,
(00:42):
Disney's benching of Jimmy Kimmel. But before we get to that,
here are a few headlines just in this morning that
you need to know. Spider Man star Tom Hollands suffered
a mild concussion on the set of Spider Man Brand
New Day. He's expected back at work in a few days.
Cassavetes has signed on to direct the US remake of
(01:03):
The Boy with Pink Pants, the young adult movie with
a strong anti bullying message was a big hit in
Italy for Eagle Pictures. Eddie Redmain's Day of the Jackal
series has hired a new writer for season two. David
Harrower has stepped in as creator Ronan Bennett steps back.
The thriller airs on Peacock and Sky. My colleague Alex
(01:25):
Ripman in London has the scoop. You can read that
story and so much more on Variety dot Com Right now.
Now we turn to conversations with Variety journalists about news
and trends in show business. If it's Monday, we're talking
box office with Rebecca Rubin, our senior film and media reporter.
(01:47):
Rebecca breaks down the weekend results and she points to
beacons on the horizon for the box office in the
shape of Leonardo DiCaprio and Taylor Swift. Rebecca Rubins, thank
you so much for joining me. Thanks for having me. Rebecca,
tell us what's going on out there? How did the
big openers this weekend do? After two really.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Strong back to back weekends in September with the Latest
Conjuring movie and The Demon's Layer, this was a pretty
soft weekend at the box office. There were two new
movies that opened Him, which is a sports thriller that
was produced by Jordan Peel, and then A Big, Bold,
Beautiful Journey, which is a romantic drama with Marco Robbie
(02:31):
and Colin Ferrell, and neither of those movies really ignited
the box office in a meaningful way.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
Do you think it's just movie going, Is it's a
typical lull, or do you think that it was a
lackluster product this weekend kept the lid on receipts.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
I would say it's probably the latter. I think that
it was a lackluster weekend in terms of new releases,
because we've seen in September, if people want to come
out to see a movie, even if it's not something
that's on most of Hollywood's radar, audiences can come out
in huge numbers whatever the weekend is. In this case,
I think the two new releases just did not have
(03:11):
the reviews or the word of mouth to get people talking.
Him had a twenty eight percent on Rotten Tomatoes, which
is quite a negative aggregate score, and A Big, Bold,
Beautiful Journey, beyond it being a bit of a tongue twister,
also had similarly negative reviews and word of mouth from
(03:31):
audiences for.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
A big, bold, beautiful journey. You had Margot Robbie, you
had Colin Farrell finally after we finally got to look
at Colin Farrell again without all that penguin makeup.
Speaker 3 (03:44):
But it also.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Seems like the kind of movie, you know, an adult
drama that you just don't see at the multiplexes as much.
What audience do you think the distributor was going for
with this movie?
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Sony actually pos positioned this movie. I remember vividly when
they announced it as a female event picture in the
vein of It Ends with Us, which was the Blake
Lively Justin Baldoni movie that, despite all the controversy, was
a huge box office success, and so they were very
(04:18):
clearly saying, here we are going after this underserved female
audience to call it a female event picture. I had
not seen that verbiage before, and so they were being
very declarative on who they were trying to get with
this movie. And like you said, it's not really the
type of movie that we see succeeding in movie theaters anymore.
(04:42):
We've seen movies from other genres succeed despite the odds,
but typically when they are succeeding despite the odds they
have behind them, the great reviews, the word of mouth,
and I think this movie just misfired on the execution.
And so if you already have a movie that critics
and audiences don't like, it's that much harder to get
them to pay money to go see it.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
How has the whole been for Demon's Layer and for
conjuring the movies that did light up a September box office.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
Demon's Layer was the number one movie again at the
North American and the International box office, and in North
America it made seventeen point three million dollars, so it
had a pretty significant seventy five percent decline from its
opening weekend, which of course set a record for anime
film grossing seventy million. And so that is a pretty
(05:35):
brutal decline. But if you are just looking at it
from a numbers perspective, seventeen million dollars for an anime
film would have been impressive in the film's first weekend.
So the fact that it made that much in its
second weekend, and this movie has already grossed over one
hundred million dollars in North America speaks to the enthusiasm
for it, and so it was on par kind of
(05:58):
with expectations that it would have a big drop, but
it still is raking in significant money.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
So there was good news for Sony this weekend as well.
How about Conjuring.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Conjuring as well had a pretty good third weekend. This
is its third weekend of release and it made thirteen
million dollars. And with this weekend's total, Conjuring last Rites,
which is I think it's the fourth Conjuring movie and
the eight, the ninth and the overall franchise, it is
now the highest grossing of the franchise with over one
(06:30):
hundred and fifty million domestically and four hundred million globally.
And this movie actually is continuing a stellar run, not
just for Warner Brothers, but New Line, which is a
subsidiary of Warner Brothers, and New Line with this movie
now has crossed the billion dollar mark just in twenty
twenty five, and that is mostly thanks to horror hits
(06:53):
like Final Destination, Bloodlines, Weapons, and so Newline is really
cleaning up this year with horror movies that are getting
audiences to turn out in droves.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
I could make a lot of cheap joke about horror
and the time that we are living in. But I'm
just gonna leave it at that. What should we look
forward to in the coming weeks of the box office?
What are exhibitors excited about?
Speaker 2 (07:15):
So if you asked anybody a few months ago, they
would probably say that Paul Thomas Anderson's new movie, One
Battle after Another, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, is a huge risk,
and it still is because it cost one hundred and
thirty million dollars to produce, or more, depending on who
you ask. But Warner Brothers has as well been on
(07:36):
this epic box office streak and all of these movies
that people were not expecting to be massive successes have
become just that, And so nobody wants to bet against
Warner Brothers at this point. And there's a chance that
One Battle after Another, which has been pretty rapturously reviewed,
could become another commercial win for Warner Brothers. That would
(07:56):
be very exciting to see because it's targeting more of
an adult audience and that is also a demographic that
is not as catered to as the box office. Another
movie that exhibitors are quite excited about is Taylor Swift's
newly announced The release party of a Showgirl, and of
course that is tied to her new album that is
(08:17):
coming out in October. And she has been a big
supporter of theatrical with her concert film that was released
in twenty twenty three. And so no matter what this
movie does, it's not gonna make the business that the
concert film did because it's a very different project. But
any money that this movie makes is just crazy that
(08:37):
they were not expecting even a few weeks ago.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
Taylor Swift is the gift that keeps on giving to
all media. And I'm so glad you mentioned one battle
after another because, dear listeners, you're gonna hear from Owen Gleiberman,
Variety's chief film critic, on this film in Tuesday's episode.
So thank you for teasing that, Rebecca, and as always,
thank you for your insights.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Thanks for having me, and I will be eager to
see how one about after another doesn't.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
And now we'll hear from Brian Steinberg on the latest
industry conflagration that has protesters lining up outside of Disney offices.
As I record this Monday morning, Jimmy Kimmel is still
on indefinite suspension from his late night show at ABC.
It's not canceled, but we don't know when he'll be
back either. Brian Steinberg, thanks for joining me.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
Glad to be here.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
You and others at Bridy have been busy on the
Jimmy kimmelbat ever since this story really blew up Wednesday
afternoon when Disney made the decision to pull him off
the air abruptly. So a lot has transpired between then
and now that we are talking. Where do you think
things stand right now in terms of the decision making
(09:53):
process for ABC and for Team Kimmel.
Speaker 3 (09:57):
I think it's a genuine effort theado to one and
a half and come back on the air. This is
a longtime employee of Disney. He's been doing this for
more than two decades. He's been ambassador for ABC and
the company hosting the Oscars other projects. Who wants to
be a millionaire?
Speaker 1 (10:15):
So, in terms of how things went down, Brendan Carr,
the head of the FCC, goes on Benny Johnson's podcast
and makes what sure sounds like a threat against ABC
about very upset about Kimmel's comments, which had gotten a
lot of backlash that day from people in certainly and
conservative and Maga media circles. Hours later, you have Next Star,
(10:36):
the single biggest owner of TV stations, saying our thirty
two ABC affiliate stations will not air Jimmy Kimmel. That's
a significant blow to his distribution in addition to a
bad blow to the pr And then minutes after that
came Sinclair, another huge station owner, saying the same thing
and asking for even more wildly unrealistic things for a
(10:58):
TV station group to ask of talent. Let me ask you, Brian,
does ABC pull him just on Brendan Carr's comments or
what was he pulled? Because Next Star in Sinclair said
we are yanking our stations.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
I have to imagine because of the Sinclair and Next Star.
Next Star is a large maybe even soon to be
larger station owner. Those are stations in New Orleans, Salt
Lake City, Nashville, places that kim on needs to reach
and kim O will do well in LA and New
York because that's the but you need to reach people
in the New South, the Midwest. Those stations are important
(11:33):
to the overall distribution of the show. Without that, then
often the rains go down. Then you have talked to
advertiser about why the rains are gone down what they're
paying for, and they pay for the guarantees even promised
by ABC. I think you know that's a problematic situation
you're in now. Can they get around it? Can they
go to put them on Hulu or Disney Plus and
get around that situation and do some ad deals.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Disney has plenty of platforms to get kim all out,
but the strength of podcast TV, and you wonder if
something prolonged like this could really continue to chip away
of the classic network affiliate relationship with Jimmy Kimmelflapp is
coming at a time when there's been simmering tensions with
the networks over how much the station groups pay the
(12:16):
networks to help the networks pay for pricey things like
football and big events. And this is obviously happening at
a time when traditional late night TV does not have
the pull it did even recently.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
Yeah, I think what's happening late night is the fragmentation
has heard it when David Letterman announced He's going to
retire a lot of folks to try to throw Spagetio
walls they can get their own share of the late
night audience. For a while, we had like MTV tried
their hand add a national geographic the science late night show.
Now you have a late night hosts now have to
(12:49):
go for a base rather than for everybody. Johnny Carson
had the whole nation watching him and our current but
of late night hosts are doing political humor to get
a lot of the success of their show these days
depends on how many YouTube hits they get an X
pass along and viral hits. And to do that, you
need to talk about do hot talk politics barbs, you know,
(13:10):
really kind of sometimes something I think a previous generation
like Arseneo Hall or Pat Sajad or Johnny Carson or
Tom Snyder would not do because they had a much
broader crowd watching every night and they had me mindful
of that. So the economics are weaker because the hosts
now have niches rather than the whole world.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Washington, do you think this gets resolved? Middle of this week? Like?
How much longer can this impass go on?
Speaker 3 (13:34):
We're the start of a brand new TV season. You
want Kimmel on the air for ABC? You would that
audience gathering at night? You've fallen back to Good Morning
America in the morning, Disney is a pillar of the
creative community in Hollywood, and a lot of people who
are actors, directors, producers are gas and a decision to
pull them off the air like this could they have
had to come on and explain himself in a way
(13:56):
that everyone can agree upon. The longer he's off, the
more this investers would Justy's base. It's employees, it's creative community.
People who work for them in movies and TV shows
and other things also come ticked off. I mean Bob
igeran Dana Walden have taken a thorny path. It is
difficult see how they they will please everybody. They may
(14:17):
have to, you know, they are business concerns, there are
creative concerns. Hollywood's watching, Washington is watching. It's difficult.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
It's a diplomatic mission, it's a business mission, and with
all things Disney, it's often inefficiable. And of course the
people that you mentioned, Bob Iger, Dana Walden, there's a
lot of scrutiny on them because there is a transition
coming for Disney in the leadership ranks. They have promised
that there will be a transition sometime in the early
part of twenty twenty six, so there's never a good
(14:45):
time for a crisis, but this would probably be a
particularly bad time for everything going on. Well, it'll be
very interesting to watch what comes Monday and beyond. Brian,
thank you for working hard to cover this. Thank you.
Let's give the last word on this segment to John Oliver,
the host of HBO's Last Week Tonight, makes a great
point about whether Next Star and Sinclair really qualify as
(15:09):
local broadcasters given their size and scope and the level
of their activity before the FCC. Here's a clip from
Sunday Nights episode.
Speaker 4 (15:18):
Well, but more than that, Claiming this is simply local
broadcasters responding to their community values is pretty hard to take.
And that this wasn't a bunch of independent stations taking
a standard. Was two of the biggest local TV ownership
groups in the country making sweeping decisions for all the
affiliates they owned. Calling these companies local broadcasters is like
(15:39):
describing Coca Cola as a neighborhood soda shop or Boeing
as a mom and pop plane crash business. It makes
no sense. Look, the sequence of events here could not
be clearer because it was all done in playing view.
Car leaned on broadcasters to take down Kimmel. They did that,
sometimes even directly so in car while doing so, and
(16:02):
that car celebrated with a fun gift. That sure seems
like a pretty clear case of the government pressuring companies.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
Two cents of speaking, as we close out today's episode,
the only certainty we have about this week is that
there will be a lot of news. We are waiting
for news on the Jimmy Kimmel front. We are waiting
for news around Warner Brothers, Discovery and what's going on
with that bidding process. But I wanted to share a
(16:30):
few thoughts from my weekend in San Diego. I attended
the Proximo conference, focused on Latino entrepreneurs and business growth.
It's always interesting to talk to people who work in
other sectors about business issues, headwinds, opportunities. It was a
great mix of people in San Diego. I'm so grateful
(16:50):
to conference organizer Nelli Galan for inviting me. I'm grateful
also to my panelist who delivered great conversations, producer Alexis Garcia,
Hurst Media's Angelica Rossas McDaniels, and Nueva Network's Renee Allegria.
I was also honored to meet the great author Sandra Cisneros.
Without question, every business conference should close out with a
(17:14):
dance party. At the end of the tribute to Cisneros
on Saturday night, the tables were empty, the dance floor
was packed, and it was joyous before we go. Congrats
to Ian Holder and Tariq Stewart. They've just been named
senior vice presidents of A and R for Capitol Records,
(17:34):
overseeing the company's urban A and R team. Holder comes
to Capital from Sony Music Publishing. Stewart was with RCAA Records.
Thanks for listening. This episode was written and reported by
me Cynthia Littleton, with contributions from Rebecca Rubin and Brian Steinberg.
Special thanks to restaurant Cocinas del Monte in San Diego
(17:56):
for not throwing me out while I recorded the box
office segment before I hopped on a bus back to
l A stick snickt hick picks. Please leave us a
review at the podcast platform of your choice, and please
tune in tomorrow for another episode of Daily Variety.
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