Information Showbiz and Celebrity Breaking News

SPOILER ALERT! This post contains details from Thursday’s episode of Ghosts.

Remember those rumors, oh, eight years ago about how Sony was a target for acquisition?

EXCLUSIVE: Amazon MGM Studios has begun the countdown for its Ryan Gosling starring, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller directing space adventure movie, Project Hail Mary for March 20, 2026. No other wide entries are on that weekend.

Sheffield DocFest, the U.K.’s leading nonfiction film festival, and the International Documentary Association are set to combine forces for the Alternate Realities Exhibition and Summit at the upcoming 31st edition of Sheffield DocFest, running from June 12-17.

Nominations are being rolled out Thursday and Friday for the 51st annual Daytime Emmy Awards, with winners to be announced in a ceremony live in June on CBS and Paramount+.

EXCLUSIVE: Apple Studios has announced the three participants selected for its inaugural Directors Program, described as an inclusive, new initiative focused on expanding opportunities for mid-career directors across the U.S.

Netflix Co-CEO Greg Peters says internal viewership data from before and after the implementation of paid password sharing shows the new policy has not turned off viewers, as some had initially predicted it would.

EXCLUSIVE: Blu Hunt (The New Mutants) and Peter Vack (PVT Chat) are in production in North Macedonia on Replay, the sophomore feature from veteran music video director Jason Lester (High Resolution), which has unveiled a first-look still.

Andy Cohen isn’t going anywhere.

Amazon isn’t putting Fallout back in the vaults.

With Aladdin producer Dan Lin taking over film leadership at Netflix from Scott Stuber, there will still be a commitment to a robust feature slate.

EXCLUSIVE: Conrad Ricamora, the actor, singer and writer known for turns in Searchlight/Hulu’s Fire Island and ABC’s How to Get Away with Murder, has signed with Paradigm for representation.

In a competitive situation, Apple has acquired the rights to Taffy Brodesser-Akner’s upcoming novel Long Island Compromise to develop as a series.

Kevin Hart and his entertainment company Hartbeat have signed with WME for representation in all areas. Hart continues to develop, star, and produce feature films, television, commercials and podcasts via Hartbeat. The move to WME comes as Hart and Hartbeat continue to expand their portfolio of multi-platform IP.

Road House and Quiet on Set brought some variety to the Nielsen streaming charts in March.

EXCLUSIVE: NBC‘s Suits: L.A. drama pilot will feature guest appearances by John Amos (Roots, Good Times), Victoria Justice and Kevin Weisman (Alias). The project is an expansion of the Suits universe from Aaron Korsh.

EXCLUSIVE: Legendary has cast Ellie Bamber in Animal Friends, a star-studded feature combining live-action and animated characters from writing duo Kevin Burrows and Matt Mider. Peter Atencio is set to direct.

Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos saw a 2023 compensation package valued at $49.8 million, down a hair from the year before but with one big change — he took more in stock option awards than in cash as the streamer shifts its pay policies.

Police are hunting for the criminals responsible for a large cannabis farm following a raid in Bolton. Officers descended on a house in Thicketford Road this afternoon (April 18) after receiving a tip-off from the community.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Netflix will no longer report subscriber numbers — which has been a key metric for streaming services for years — beginning with the first quarter of 2025. The company made the announcement in releasing its first-quarter 2024 earnings Thursday. Netflix handily topped expectations for subscribers net adds, gaining 9.33 million in the period, to reach nearly 270 million globally.

The Directors Guild of America said Thursday that it will hold its 77th annual DGA Awards on February 8, 2025 at the Beverly Hilton.

EXCLUSIVE: ABC Signature has acquired The Redemption of Al Sharpton, the recent Esquire profile of the civil rights activist by Pulitzer Prize winner Mitchell S. Jackson, to develop as a limited series. No talent is attached at this point but the intention is for Anthony Anderson to star as Sharpton and executive produce. Artists First’s E. Brian Dobbins (black-ish) also is expected to executive produce the project, now in very early stages, with Jackson getting a producing credit.

The dual Hollywood strikes are history, but production has been slow to return in Los Angeles, especially for television projects. The city and county’s film office said today that local on-location filming declined by 8.7% the first quarter, recording only 6,823 shoot days from January through March.

NCIS: Origins has added Daniel Bellomy (Power Book II: Ghost), Caleb Martin Foote (Made For Love) and Robert Taylor (Longmire) in recurring roles. The CBS prequel to the venerable procedural has a straight-to-series order for the 2024-2025 broadcast season.

EXCLUSIVE: NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council), the Black List, the Redford Center, and the CAA Foundation today announced the recipients of the 2024 NRDC Climate Storytelling Fellowship and the Hollywood creatives who will mentor them. Along with new partner NBCUniversal, the organizations also announced the opening of the submission window for the 2025 cycle of the fellowship.

My guest this week is Rebecca Ferguson. She recently reprised her role of Lady Jessica with Dune: Part Two, and plays the lead role in Silo, Apple TV+‘s dystopian series about a community gone underground following an apocalyptic event. Ferguson stars as Juliette, an engineer-reluctantly-turned-sheriff, who uncovers alarming secrets while investigating a mysterious death.

EXCLUSIVE: Film Movement has acquired U.S. and Canadian distribution rights to the acclaimed documentary Obsessed with Light, which explores the influence of one of the most remarkable figures in American arts – dancer-choreographer Loïe Fuller.

Netflix added 9.3 million subscribers in the quarter ended March 31, reaching 269.6 million worldwide, and outperformed expectations in other key areas in its latest strong financial report.

Netflix said today it will stop reporting quarterly subscriber numbers starting in 2025, a huge change for the giant streamer whose stock tends to get buffeted up or down (mostly up lately) by those numbers. In a letter to shareholders along with first-quarter earnings, the company said it’s now focused on other metrics and that memberships “are just one component of our growth.”

Gurinder Chadha (Bend It Like Beckham) is pushing forward with Christmas Karma, a contemporary Bollywood musical set in London and inspired by Charles Dickens’ seminal A Christmas Carol, with Kunal Nayyar (The Big Bang Theory) signed on to lead an ensemble cast.