Warner Bros. Discovery’s Zaslav Shows New Combative Streak, Tweaking Media Rivals

In what should come as no surprise, James Gunn will be directing his own script for Superman: Legacy, a major lynchpin project which will off the the multi-platform connected DC universe – “Chapter One, Gods and Monsters” ­– which he and his DC’ Co-Chairmen & CEO Peter Safran are launching.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Fox is hungry for a different kind of advertising dollar. The Fox Corp.-owned broadcast network has thrived for years on outlays from movie studios and fast-food chains, but in 2023, it’s looking to expand its relationship with something that might be more hearty. Armed with its recent launch of the Studio Ramsay Global with celebrity chef and entrepreneur Gordon Ramsay, Fox is eager to court more food advertisers and marketers who are eager to woo consumers who like food experiences. “We are really the only broadcast network with any food-related programming, over 80 hours a year,” says Suzanne Sullivan, eecutive vice president of ad sales for Fox Entertainment, in an interview. Fox hopes the combination of Ramsay’s shows on its broadcast network and a new spate of short-form content that will be available on Tubi with the launch of a FAST channel that make use of Ramsay’s tens of hours of Fox content will whet Madison Avenue’s appetite for the concept. In the recent past, Fox has sought between $75,000 and $100,000 for a 30-second spot in such programming on linear TV, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Pablo Torre is about to become a creature of two worlds. The veteran ESPN writer and on-air personality is leaving the Disney sports-media giant — and he’s staying, too. Torre is joining Meadowlark Media, the content company founded by former ESPN chief John Skipper and the sports commentator Dan Le Batard. And yet, Torre is expected to remain a regular contributor to “Around The Horn” and “Pardon The Interruption,” two of the mainstay programs on the ESPN daytime schedule. “They are looking to build another show directly out of ‘The Dan LeBatard Show,’ which is a monster,” Torre says of Meadowlark in an interview. Torre envisions a digital program with audio and video components that will allow him to “tell original stories, do a bit of journalism and figure out how to make that show a home that can fit all of the things I aspire to do creatively.” Torre will also contribute to Meadowlark’s unscripted efforts.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor When NBC News announced in January that Hallie Jackson, its senior Washington correspondent, would leave the anchoring duties she had held at MSNBC since 2016, some eyebrows rose. But NBC News was chasing something else on the rise: Digital audiences. Since Jackson began anchoring a late-afternoon hour on NBC News Now in December 2021, a growing audience has sought her out. Viewership surged 108% over the course of a year. “You don’t see those numbers in many businesses,” says Janelle Rodriguez, the NBC News executive vice president who oversees the streaming outlet, in an interview. “When you see that level of audience increase, you know you are on to something,” On Monday, Jackson will double her time on her program, “Hallie Jackson Now,” to two hours, which means she will hold forth from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.

“I have no breaking story about a Veep comeback,” Matt Walsh told us at Deadline’s SXSW studio, “I wish I did because it would blow up the internet.”

Bloomberg reported on Thursday and TheWrap independently confirmed.The name change is meant to signal that the service will not just be HBO Max with Discovery content, nor will HBO Max be ported over to Discovery+. “Max” is the leading contender, though Warner Bros.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Never fear, genre fans: Warner Bros. Discovery is intent on mining as much of its tentpole Warner Bros. IP as possible in the near future, whether that be through its upcoming revamped DC Universe, the newly announced “The Lord of the Rings” movies, or more projects based on J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” franchise amid the success of video game “Hogwarts Legacy.” “DC is an enormous opportunity and two important building blocks are in place now with the leadership team, Peter [Safran] and James [Gunn], and James has been breathing comics for as long as he’s been alive, essentially,” Warner Bros. Discovery CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels said during a panel at Morgan Stanley’s investor conference Wednesday. “A great creative leader here. And the second building block that is in place is the one-company approach, because I think you can only manage a franchise if everything is coordinated and the team is working together extremely well. There’s an enormous level of collaboration and joint decision making around what should work hand in hand across the franchise.”

13D and 13G reports. For those outside of the inside-baseball world of corporate finance: Forty-five days out from the end of the year, companies are required to have filed 13D and 13G disclosure forms with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These reports are required for investors who amass 5% or more of a company’s total stock issue. Starting with this primer on how to monitor big-dollar investment bets, Variety will offer a quarterly survey of how the media and entertainment sector is faring among the world’s most sophisticated stock pickers.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Warner Bros. Discovery, which is struggling with billions of dollars in debt, is willing to pay more money to executives who might be able to help reduce it. The owner of HBO, Discovery Channel and Food Network said Monday in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that it would pay out new rewards to CEO David Zaslav, six senior staffers and an unspecified group of others if they could meet certain goals of new generation of free cash flow. “The changes to the Warner Bros. Discovery executive compensation program are designed to further incentivize Company employees, including members of its leadership team and others whose efforts are critical to achieving the key near-term financial objectives of increased free cash flow and reduced leverage,” said WBD board chairman Samuel A. Di Piazza, Jr. in a prepared statement.“The WBD board is confident that these additional incentives offer a more competitive package against the backdrop of ongoing industry-wide transformation and economic headwinds, and better position the company to advance core drivers of shareholder value.”

Warner Bros. Discovery has tweaked its CEO’s employment contract, granting a bigger pot of restricted stock units but linking them to free cash flow targets.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Seven of the biggest media-buying agencies on Madison Avenue and Roku have joined a media-industry effort that aims to count TV audiences in new ways. Dentsu, WPP’s GroupM, Horizon Media, Interpublic Group’s IPG Mediabrands, Omnicom Group’s Omnicom Media Group, Publicis Media and RPA have all lent counsel to the U.S. Joint Industry Committee, a consortium formed in January led by Fox, NBCUniversal, Paramount, TelevisaUnivision, and Warner Bros. Discovery and their Open AP joint venture that hopes to vet and certify a dizzying array of audience-measurement technologies that have come to market in recent months.  Along with Roku, Hallmark Media and the industry group Video Advertising Bureau, the companies have issued a new set of minimum requirements for acceptance of several new measurement technologies that TV networks would like to implement more quickly.

With today’s “urgent reminder” directed to its membership, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences again is doing its damnedest to get out the vote. The Oscar event is still a battlefield of “gold, sweat and tears” as portrayed in Oscar Wars, Michael Schulman’s new book, despite the ominous industry challenges.

Amazon Studios head Jennifer Salke feels about Warner Bros. making competing projects based on J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings.” Salke, who has held the top content job at Amazon since 2018, walked a Monday red carpet for the premiere of Michael B. Jordan’s “Creed III” where she spoke with Variety about last week’s news that Warner Bros. had secured film rights to some of Tolkien’s books. One of Salke’s defining moves at Amazon was to secure television rights to the same literary works, which she achieved at great expense. The first season of Amazon’s “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” premiered in 2022 with a big global marketing push and critical acclaim — as well as a reported budget north of $450 million for the first batch of episodes. Previously, Warner Bros. pushed out two massively successful film franchises with auteur Peter Jackson beginning in 2001. Those films grossed over $5 billion at the worldwide box office and brought home a best picture Oscar for one of the entries.

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.

Lord Of The Rings films, but not everyone is happy about it.Warner Bros Discovery’s CEO, David Zaslav, announced on an investors’ call on Thursday that a deal had been brokered to make “multiple” films based on J. R.

Middle Earth is returning to the big screen.

The obvious question in David Zaslav’s reveal today that Warner Bros/New Line intend to to head back into Middle-earth with rights owner Embracer and expand the Lord of the Rings franchise is this: What do the Kiwi creatives who architected the Oscar-winning, billion-dollar-grossing franchise feel about the whole thing?

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.

Call “2023 will be a year of building,” Warner Bros Discovery boss David Zaslav made a point today on the company’s latest earnings call to sing the praises of CNN’s “more inclusive range of voices and viewpoints.”

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.