Nexstar CEO Perry Sook said the company’s acquisition of the CW has already paid for itself in terms of adding muscle to the company’s distribution negotiations.
09.02.2023 - 01:19 / deadline.com
As Disney reported better-than-expected financials for the fiscal first quarter, CEO Bob Iger said the company is “embarking on a significant transformation” that will reshape the company he rejoined last November.
The media giant showed improvement across a range of financial categories during the quarter ending December 31, compared with its dismal showing last November just prior to the ouster of CEO Bob Chapek. Revenue rose 8% to $23.5 billion compared with the year-ago period and earnings per share hit 99 cents, excluding certain items. Both the revenue and profit line outdid Wall Street analysts’ expectations.
Theme parks, which have come roaring back to life after the grueling struggle with Covid, powered the quarterly performance. Revenue and operating income in the Parks, Experiences and Products division jumped 21% and 25%, respectively. The only significant blemish on the numbers was a decrease in operating days at Shangai Disneyland due to a wave of Covid shutdowns in China during the quarter.
Operating losses in direct-to-consumer streaming narrowed to $1.1 billion from $1.5 billion, which was better than the company’s forecast for a $200 million reduction. Including Disney+Hotstar, Disney+ had its first negative quarter since launching in November 2019, dropping 2.4 million customers to come in at 161.8 million. The loss of some International Premier League cricket rights accounted for the downturn in subscribers, the company said.
Outside of the Hotstar bundle, Disney+ gained 1.4 million subscribers over the previous quarter, reaching 104.3 million, beating a forecast offered in the most recent quarter by CFO Christine McCarthy. Hulu, counting both its on-demand offering and pay-TV bundle, hit 48 million
Nexstar CEO Perry Sook said the company’s acquisition of the CW has already paid for itself in terms of adding muscle to the company’s distribution negotiations.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ new book — a possible prelude to a 2024 presidential run — includes a chapter highlighting his efforts last year to pass a parental rights bill, dubbed the “don’t say gay” law by detractors, amid opposition from The Walt Disney Co.
Seven months after landing the highly coveted top jobs at Warner Bros. Motion Picture studios, Co-Chairpersons Michael De Luca and Pamela Abdy were bestowed with the PGA Milestone award tonight and paid respect for their mega industry mentors, remembered emotionally their cinematic NYC and New Jersey youths, and gave a huge shoutout to their new boss, Warner Discovery CEO David Zaslav.
EXCLUSIVE: Oscar season used to boil down to one main thing for Condé Nast: Vanity Fair‘s party. While the famed bash is back this year, there’s also a more consequential reason for the company to feel festive: The New Yorker‘s record five nominations across all three short film categories.
The motivation for continuing to offer Discovery+ as a stand-alone streaming service after a combined offering with HBO Max debuts later this spring, is largely financial, Warner Bros Discovery CEO David Zaslav says.
Warner Bros Discovery revenue fell 11% to $11 billion (or a drop of 9% when foreign exchange fluctuations are excluded), mostly due to advertising softness and tough studio comparisons.
Star Wars actor Liam Neeson has spoken out against the explosive growth of the Lucasfilm franchise, expressing the belief that it’s been damaged by the constant churning out of spin-offs.
Tatiana Siegel On Nov. 20, Disney shocked Hollywood when it announced that Bob Iger would return as CEO after less than a year away. Two days later, Disney’s “Avatar: The Way of Water” landed a coveted China release. Then, the sci-fi film received a rare release extension in China that allowed it to run through Feb. 14, enabling it to gross more than $240 million in the country. Though Disney insiders say China’s embrace of “Avatar” was unrelated to Iger’s return, its success and a string of good fortune for the company has raised eyebrows at rival studios. That’s because after seeing its Marvel releases denied entry to China for nearly four years, Disney recently announced that “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” and “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” were being waved into the country. (“Avengers: Endgame” in 2019 was the last Disney Marvel movie to secure a release in the Middle Kingdom, earning $632 million there.) And if things seem cozier between Disney and China, there’s no missing that a recent “Simpsons” episode that took a shot at the country’s human rights record never appeared on Disney+ in Hong Kong. The episode’s infraction involved a bit where a virtual tour guide tells Marge: “Behold the wonders of China. Bitcoin mines, forced labor camps where children make smartphones.” That joke was enough for the episode to receive the boot. The “Simpsons” move represents a stark difference from Disney’s recent approach elsewhere in Asia, where it chose to forego the release of titles including “Thor” and “Lightyear” rather than cave to pressure from censors over those films’ LGBTQ characters.
Paramount is betting that new and existing subscribers to Paramount+ are big fans of Showtime. Executives touted thr integration of the streaming service and the cable television channel as a key justification for raising prices for the direct-to-consumer service’s premium tier Thursday as they discussed the media giant’s earnings. Later this year, the top tier of Paramount+ will rise from $9.99 per month to $11.99 per month.
Cynthia Littleton Business Editor Paramount Global is preparing to hike the monthly price of Paramount+ later this year, and the company disclosed its intent to take as much as a $1.5 billion write-down from the integration of Showtime with the streaming platform. Paramount Global chief financial officer Naveen Chopra unveiled the pricing plan details and plans for a $1.3 billion-$1.5 billion impairment charge as Showtime is blended into Paramount+ in the U.S. Paramount is aiming for $700 million in savings as Showtime and Paramount+ become one. Paramount Global CEO Bob Bakish acknowledged in a conference call with Wall Street analysts on Thursday morning that the company hit big “headwinds” in 2022 and that 2023 will not be a robust year for profits. “We are at peak investment in 2023” in Paramount+, Bakish said.
Only 10 episodes of The Gordita Chronicles were produced before HBO Max canceled the comedy last summer amid a pullback on live-action kids and family programming. But at least creator Claudia Forestieri felt good knowing that new viewers could still find the show on the streamer.
Residents in one of Manchester's trendiest neighbourhoods are set to get something they've wanted for ages - a rejuvenated park.
Anthony Ramos is ready to dive into the universe, even if he had to encounter some deadly animals along the way. ET's Kevin Frazier spoke to Ramos ahead of Super Bowl LVII Sunday, where he shared what it was like to film Transformers: Rise of the Beasts in Peru.«Going to Machu Picchu, we were at Cuzco and we went to the Amazon right on the outskirts of the jungle. It was crazy,» Ramos shared. «It was wild.
EXCLUSIVE: Blumhouse/Sony/Depth of Field’s They Listen has added Greg Hill to the Chris Weitz written and directed feature. The pic reps Hill’s second collaboration with director Weitz, having worked with him on MGM’s post-World War II thriller Operation Finale, as part of the ensemble cast that included Oscar Isaac, Ben Kingsley, Melanie Laurent and Nick Kroll.
Disney shares slid into red numbers Thursday after jumping 5% earlier in the day on the news that activist investor Nelson Peltz has ended his proxy fight with the company.
Disney Entertainment, the new division run by Dana Walden and Alan Bergman, will oversee the company’s main streaming services including Disney+ as details of the company strategic restructuring emerge.
Disney CEO Bob Iger today called Marvel chairman Isaac Perlmutter’s backing of activist investor Nelson Peltz “a curious dynamic.”
Disney CEO Bob Iger said today that he’s open to selling Hulu — instead of forking over billions of dollars to buy out Comcast’s stake in the streaming platform.
Deadline reports that Disney CEO Bob Iger had good and bad news on a Q1 earnings call yesterday. The bad first: Disney initiates a $5.5 billion cost-saving plan that nixes 7,000 jobs across the entire company.
Disney CEO Bob Iger on Wednesday reaffirmed the company’s longstanding guidance to investors that its streaming business will become profitable by the end of fiscal 2024.