The non-disclosure agreement comes two weeks after a Paramount’s monthlong exclusive negotiating window with David Ellison’s Skydance ended with no deal but the indie studio still hanging in, still interested. Sony and private equity giant Apollo kicked things off previously with a preliminary bid of $26 billion, but what’s being contemplated now is not that, but something narrower. A look at the books is necessary to move forward in any case.
For two decades Coleman labored in movies and TV shows as a talented but largely unnoticed performer. That changed abruptly in 1976 when he was cast as the incorrigibly corrupt mayor of the hamlet of Fernwood in Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, a satirical soap opera that was so over the top no network would touch it, forcing producer Norman Lear to syndicate it. Coleman won a an an Emmy Award for best supporting actor in Peter Levin's 1987 small screen legal drama Sworn to Silence. Some of his recent credits include Ray Donovan and a recurring role on Boardwalk Empire, for which he won two Screen Actors Guild Awards. Coleman was 92.
CNN will make its June 27 presidential debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump available for simulcast by other networks, a spokesperson said Friday. ABC News, which is planning a Sept. 10 debate, has said that it will provide the feed to other networks.
Julia Phelps, Paramount Global’s EVP, chief communications and corporate marketing officer will leave the company at the end of May. Her group — which encompasses corporate communications, marketing, social impact, ESG, creative & strategy, production, board relations and events and brand experience — will report to studio chief Brian Robbins on an interim basis.
Dow Climbs 134, Nasdaq Slips 12, S&P Adds 6
The Dow finished above 40,000 Friday to cap Wall Street's latest winning week.
Thursday marked the conclusion of the third week of negotiations between IATSE and the AMPTP on a new three-year deal for the L.A. Locals. The union had planned to wrap up talks on the basic agreement by the time the clock struck midnight, but the parties were unable to reach an agreement and will be extending talks.
As TikTok and its massive creator base attempt to block the potential ban/selloff in the U.S., the ByteDance-owned social media company is continuing to compete with YouTube by testing the ability for users to upload hour-long videos. The company says that the feature, which marks the platform's longest video-upload length by 30 minutes, is currently available to a limited group of users in select markets.
Fox’s nascent sales house has struck its first third-party distribution agreement for a TV series, taking rights to Australian docu-soap Billion Dollar Playground.
‘Young Sheldon’ Series Finale Hits Four-Year Audience High
The Big Bang Theory prequel series wrapped things up on Thursday night, and the two-episode finale scored 8.95 million viewers, according to live plus same-day Nielsen data. Not only was it the top broadcast of the night, it was also the most-watched episode of Young Sheldon in four years — since the Season 3 finale in April 2020. That episode managed 10.15 million same-day viewers.
The FCC has issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that would revise rules governing low-power TV stations in a number of areas, including online public file requirements, and rules governing operations of Class A television, LPTV and TV translator stations.
A new Aluma study indicates that pay TV subs are far more likely to buy the new Venu Sports service, which would accelerate cord cutting.
Warner Bros. Discovery and the NBA continue to have discussions about reaching a new broadcast deal. WBD has matching rights if the NBA signs a deal with NBCUniversal for a package of games. If WBD matches NBCU’s bid, it’s unclear if the league has full discretion to walk away from the matched offer, sources say.
Michael Cohen, who continued to testify Thursday, invoked from the stand the names of several high-profile media figures, putting their relationships with the former Trump fixer in the spotlight.
Journalists participating in the pilot program will use AI to produce bulleted "key points" of their stories.
It was intended to be a teaser for future research validating ad attention measurement by medium, but the Advertising Research Foundation this week teased an anecdotal finding from its latest phase indicating TV outperforms the attention of social media by a margin of more than two-to-one.
OpenAI Signs Data, Advertising Deal With Reddit
In a major licensing deal for the artificial intelligence firm OpenAI, the organization says that it has inked a multifaceted deal with the web platform Reddit. OpenAI founder and CEO Sam Altman is among Reddit's largest shareholders.
"All the shows that are bubble shows, I guess you would call them, we love them all, you know, probably can't do them all," Brad Schwartz, the CW’s president of entertainment, said on Thursday.
The buzzed-about Netflix series ranks third among original series and ninth overall.
Requiem For The General Manager
An unsettling trend of putting GMs in charge of multiple markets is creeping into the industry. It doesn’t bode well for those who hope for any degree of proficiency at that scale.
Technology leaders from NBC Regional Sports Networks, Sinclair, Gray Television, Hearst Television and Fox Television Stations discuss the benefits and challenges of remote production in an IP environment in a TVNewsCheck Working Lunch webinar on July 16 at 1 p.m. ET. Register here.
New Jobs Posted To TVNewsCheck
New jobs posted to TVNewsCheck’s Media Job Center include openings for a station vice president and general manager and a lifestyle show producer. Existing jobs include openings for a director of student media, a national operations manager, a digital platform specialist and an account executive.