Disney Accused of ‘Self-Dealing’ by Fox Slate Financier

Addressing Thursday night’s carriage impasse with Disney, Charter Communications executives told Wall Street investors on a conference call today that their linear video business is “at the edge of a precipice.”

California Treasurer Fiona Ma has sent letters to the CEOs of seven Hollywood studios urging a return to the bargaining table with the WGA and SAG-AFTRA to end a months-long double strike that’s shut down much of the entertainment industry and is taking a major toll on the California economy.

Disney has been hit again with another lawsuit from investors over the alleged sleight of hand accounting the company used to hide streaming losses.

Gene Maddaus Senior Media Writer Remington Chase, a former film producer who was accused of swindling investors out of at least $234 million, has been reported dead in the United Kingdom. Chase, 65, died of liver failure on July 31 at Victoria Hospital in Blackpool, according to a death certificate provided to Variety by the Blackpool Registration Service. His death was also confirmed by his wife, Linda Biron of Marina del Rey, Calif., who said he was a “good person.” “He got mixed up with some wrong people,” she said in an interview.

EXCLUSIVE: Nautilus, the U.K. live-action Captain Nemo series commissioned by Disney+ two years ago, is no longer headed to the streamer, Deadline has learned.

EXCLUSIVE: Amid a focus on content curation and Disney-owned IP, Disney+ is not proceeding with The Spiderwick Chronicles, its live-action series adaptation of the popular children’s fantasy books, Deadline has learned.

Disney+ has “pretty much” hit its target of creating 50 original international titles, according to its Europe content boss.

Disney has been hit with a lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court by film financier TSG, which claims that the media giant used “nearly every trick in the Hollywood accounting book” to hoard hundreds of millions in profit.

So it looks like there might be a big change to the planned Marvel/Disney+ release schedule in 2023.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis urged The Walt Disney Co. to drop its lawsuit against him, while telling CNBC that he has “moved on” from his battle with company and that it should drop the lawsuit against him.

As the ongoing WGA strike hits 100 days, the entirety of Hollywood wonders how long both that and the SAG-AFTRA strike will last. In the case of WGA, this strike is no officially longer than the 2007-2008 strike, but has a ways to go before it hits the 1988 writers’ strike 153 days, the longest in the union’s history.  Disney CEO Bob Iger hopes neither strike lasts that long, though.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Disney is coming for the streaming password-sharing freeloaders. Taking a page from Netflix’s playbook, Disney chief Bob Iger announced that the media conglomerate has put a priority on finding ways to convert password-borrowing users into paying customers.

Disney CEO Bob Iger shook up the entertainment industry and Wall Street last month when he declared to CNBC at Sun Valley that linear television may be non-core and that he’s looking for partners for ESPN as the company pivots to streaming.

Hulu will increase its ad-free subscription from $14.99 to $17.99 per month.Disney+ will also see a jump from $10.99 to $13.99 for its monthly ad-free plan.And before you and your close circle decide to chip in for a shared account, you should know that Disney CEO Bob Iger also announced Wednesday that the company is “actively exploring ways to address account sharing and the best options for paying subscribers to share their accounts with friends and families.”In other words: a crackdown on password sharing, perhaps similar to what Netflix introduced in May, is coming to Hulu. What’s more, the company introduced a new ad-free Disney+ and Hulu bundle — without ESPN+ — called “Duo Premium,” available Sept.

Disney interim chief financial officer Kevn Lansberry said the company is “very comfortable with our current liquidity position” as the time approaches for it to buy Comcast’s one-third stake in Hulu.

Disney’s giant theme park division was first out of the gate in a post-pandemic recovery, showing giant jumps in revenue and profit due to pent-up demand. But the engine is sputtering.

Get ready to pay more for Disney+ and Hulu if you’re a subscriber.

“It is my fervent hope that we quickly find solutions to the issues that have kept us apart these past few months, “said Bob Iger today of the Writers Guild and actors’ union’s strikes on Disney’s earnings call. “And I am personally committed to achieve this result.”

Disney is following through on stated plan to raise streaming prices (welcome news to investors if not to many consumers), as well as launching a bundled version of Disney+ and Hulu and expanding the ad-supported version of Disney+ to Europe and Canada.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Disney, trying to swing its streaming business into the black, has set substantial price hikes for Disney+ and Hulu standalone premium plans in the U.S. — while also rolling out a heavily discounted Disney+/Hulu ad-free combo bundle. As of Oct.