Jennifer Maas: Last News

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Warner Bros. Discovery received stock upgrades from two media analyst firms Friday for, among other things, making the decision to tie bonuses for CEO David Zaslav and his team to free cash flow performance. “We threw everything and the kitchen sink at a Downside Case scenario for WBD, and it still delevers to 3x by ’25E,” Wells Fargo analysts wrote in a research note published Friday, in which they upgraded WBD’s stock to “overweight” with a price target increase from $13 to $20 per share. “We now have conviction in FCF to limit downside, while the stock has asymmetric upside.” Meanwhile, Wolfe Research moved WBD from its “peer perform” rating to “outperform” and also upped the price target to $20. (At time of publication Friday, WBD stock was trading at $14.51 per share.)

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Bruce Dixon and Hozefa Lokhandwala have been on the job for less than two weeks as co-CEOs of Vice Media Group. But despite the newness of their current roles, Lokhandwala and Dixon are already well versed in the inner workings of the Brooklyn-based company, having served for several years in senior roles under recently exited CEO Nancy Dubuc. Lokhandwala has been chief strategy officer at VMG since October 2018, and Dixon has held the position of CFO since 2021 and was previously CFO of Vice Studios. Both were brought in by Dubuc — who departed the company Feb. 24 after nearly five years as CEO — and now seek to follow in her footsteps while shaping the future of Vice, a company that has been seeking a buyer over the past year.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers from Monday’s episode of Fox’s “9-1-1,” entitled “In Another Life.” Well, “9-1-1” fans, you can stop holding your breath, because Evan “Buck” Buckley (Oliver Stark) came back to life following his literal shocking “death” from a lightening bolt strike during the March 6 episode. But before he returned to us, and the 118, Buck had to journey through a world created in his coma brain in which his older brother, Daniel (played by “Mad Men” alum Aaron Staton), had lived and Buck never became a firefighter. During the episode, Buck has a very “It’s a Wonderful Life” experience in learning what the lives of Bobby (Peter Krause), Maddie (Jennifer Love Hewitt), Eddie (Ryan Guzman), Chimney (Kenneth Choi) and more of his friends and family would be like if that one thing had changed.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Because triples is best, “I Think You Should Leave With Tim Robinson” has finally set the premiere date for its highly anticipated third season, just under a year after Netflix announced its renewal. And it just so happens that the debut is planned for May 30, one day before the 2023 Primetime Emmy eligibility cutoff, meaning the six-episode third season of Robinson’s absurdist sketch comedy series will be in the running for this year’s noms at TV’s biggest night. Created and written by Robinson and Zach Kanin, Netflix promises the third season of “I Think You Should Leave” will see the duo “bring their distinct comedy style and observational humor to the forefront, continuing to poke fun at life’s most bizarre and mundane situations.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer “Shrinking” has been renewed for Season 2 at Apple TV+. Co-created by Jason Segel, Bill Lawrence and Brett Goldstein, the series stars Segel and Harrison Ford in one of his first television roles. “Shrinking” follows grieving therapist Jimmy (Segel) who starts to break the rules and tell his clients exactly what he thinks. Ignoring his training and ethics, he finds himself making huge, tumultuous changes to people’s lives, including his own, per Apple’s description. In addition to Segel and Ford (as Paul), “Shrinking” stars Jessica Williams (Gaby), Christa Miller (Liz), Lukita Maxwell (Alice), Michael Urie (Brian) and Luke Tennie (Sean).

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer J.J. Abrams and Matt Reeves’ animated series “Batman: Caped Crusader” has been picked up at Amazon after being scrapped at HBO Max, Variety has confirmed. The streamer has placed a two-season order for the cartoon, which is described as “a reimagining of the Batman mythology through the visionary lens” of executive producers Abrams, Reeves and Bruce Timm. “Batman: Caped Crusader” was ordered to series at HBO Max in May 2021. In August 2022, the show was scrapped along with five other upcoming animated series set up at the Warner Bros. Discovery-owned streamer, including “Merry Little Batman,” “The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie,” “Bye Bye Bunny: A Looney Tunes Musical,” “Did I Do That to the Holidays: A Steve Urkel Story” and “The Amazing World of Gumball: The Movie.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer On the heels of the success of MGM’s “Creed III,” Michael B. Jordan and Amazon are in talks for a film and TV universe expanding the “Creed” world, Variety has confirmed. Details are scarce regarding what projects are being discussed, but sources say the conversations are underway. Amazon declined comment and a representative for Jordan did not immediately respond to Variety‘s request. “Creed III” emerged victorious at the box office with its impressive $58.7 million debut, setting a franchise record while dethroning two-time domestic charts champ “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers from the “Poker Face” Season 1 finale, “The Hook,” now streaming on Peacock. Benjamin Bratt sucked it in like Rin Tin Tin or Anne Boleyn to shoot one standout scene in the Season 1 finale of “Poker Face.” The bit in question featured a poetic recitation of the entire third verse (and one line of the hook) of Blues Traveler’s 1994 earworm “Hook” by Bratt’s character, Cliff Legrand, to Natasha Lyonne’s Charlie Cale while taking her back for judgement by his boss, casino mogul Sterling Frost Sr. Why does he do this (an act that makes Charlie call him “the fucking worst”)? Only “Poker Face” creator Rian Johnson really knows for sure — but Bratt, Lyonne and “Poker Face” showrunners Nora and Lilla Zuckerman were all on board with the idea once the “Knives Out” and “Glass Onion” filmmaker wrote it into Episode 10, aptly titled “The Hook.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers from the “Poker Face” Season 1 finale, “The Hook,” now streaming on Peacock. “Poker Face” revealed more about the personal life of protagonist Charlie Cale (Natasha Lyonne) than viewers learned throughout the first nine episode of Rian Johnson’s Peacock howdunit series, with the introduction of her sister Emily Cale (Clea DuVall) when Charlie needs a place to hide out after she’s accused of another murder. This is when we discover that Charlie has had a rough history with her sister, and hasn’t seen her in so long that she’s never even met her young niece, Shasta.

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.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Though Showtime is being rebranded into Paramount+ With Showtime, Paramount Global CEO Bob Bakish says the Showtime brand is alive and well and more projects based on the cable channel’s most iconic series, including “Ray Donovan,” are in the pipeline for the integrated platform. “We’re not just doing that streaming, we’re doing that linear as well,” Bakish said during a Morgan Stanley-hosted investor conference. “So come sometime this year, when you turn on Showtime linear, it’s going to be Paramount+ With Showtime. And it’s what I call a win-win-win. It’s a win for consumers, because the product is going to be fundamentally better than Showtime. You’re going to get ‘1923’ on it, you’ll get ‘Tulsa King,’ as part of your Showtime subscription. It’s just going to be a bigger, broader product. We fundamentally believe in a broad thesis. So that will work at the consumer level and as part of that, we’re leaning into the Showtime franchises. So you could think about the slate as smaller, which will be less expensive, but also really giving the people what they want — which is more Showtime, maybe more ‘Dexter,’ maybe more ‘Ray Donovan,’ and really leaning into that. And we have some exciting plans there.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Nexstar is still dark on internet streamer FuboTV on Tuesday, the TV station group giant’s president and chief operating officer explained why. “We are in a dispute with CBS right now over the Fubo situation,” Tom Carter said during a Morgan Stanley-hosted investor conference. “But keep in mind that virtual MVPDs contribute less than 10% of our distribution revenue and our distribution revenue is about half of our total revenue and Fubo is the smallest vMVPD we deal with. So we’re talking about a relatively minor amount of money, quite honestly, to both us and CBS. So it’s kind of easy to pick Fubo as a fight to have.” Nexstar executive vice president and chief financial officer Lee Ann Gliha noted: “We view this as a CBS-only issues and it’s just driven by the specific issues that surround the CBS situation.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer MRC has set Jenna Santoianni as the studio’s new president of television, following the exit of former president Elise Henderson. In her new role, Santoianni will oversee MRC’s current programming, its full slate of development, all joint ventures and production partnerships, as well as all of the television studio’s operational units, including production, business and legal affairs and production finance. Reporting to recently named MRC CEO Scott Tenley, Santoianni is expected to begin this week. She joins the studio amid a restructuring that saw Tenley elevated, while co-founders Modi Wiczyk and Asif Satchu assumed the new roles of chairmen. Jonathan Golfman and Brye Adler remain co-presidents of film and Amit Dey as head of non-fiction.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers from Fox’s “9-1-1” Season 6 spring premiere on Monday, entitled “In a Flash.” The sixth season of Fox first-responder drama “9-1-1” returned Monday after a months-long winter hiatus, with an episode in which almost everything goes surprisingly right for the 118 — until it goes horribly wrong. Before the bad came the good, when Maddie (Jennifer Love Hewitt) and Chimney (Kenneth Choi) hosted their families at their new house with daughter Jee-Yun. Maddie was expecting her and Buck’s (Oliver Stark) parents, and imagining that they would be quite judgmental and rude, as they have been in the past. Chimney, meanwhile, had invited only his brother Albert (John Harlan Kim), but got a surprise visit from his estranged father and stepmother, as well — immediately assuming they would be even harder on him than Maddie’s parents would be on her.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer What started as a singing competition special featuring Wiz Khalifa and Bebe Rexha that aired during NBA All-Star Weekend on TNT is now being shopped as a full-format series, Variety has learned. From “The Biggest Loser” and “World of Dance” executive producer Alex Katz, co-founder of Anagram Studios, the special was titled “The Sum” and though it prominently featured Wiz Khalifa and Rexha, they weren’t the competitors. Their fans, singing along to their hit songs, were the real players. Per “The Sum’s” description, “‘The Sum’ is an original concept based on the best part of any concert — fans singing along with the artists, also known as ‘the common chorus effect.’ In ‘The Sum,’ fans share the spotlight with their favorite music stars by performing a song together.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers from “Poker Face” Episode 9, “Escape From Shit Mountain,” now streaming on Peacock. A week before the “Poker Face” Season 1 finale, Thursday’s episode featured one of series creator Rian Johnson’s favorite collaborators — Joseph Gordon-Levitt. And with “Poker Face” being the show it is, if you aren’t Natasha Lyonne’s Charlie Cale, you’re either a murder victim, the murderer or an innocent bystander who gets caught in the crossfire. Lucky for Gordon-Levitt, who says he was thrilled to learn that “Knives Out” and “Glass Onion” filmmaker Johnson had assigned him a ultimate “total dick” role. Gordon-Levitt was not just the murderer in this installment, “Escape From Shit Mountain,” but the most prolific murderer of the first season — someone who actually attempts to kill Charlie herself.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Fox has named John Hesling its new head of Alternative Entertainment, the broadcast network’s in-house unscripted studio. Responsible for overseeing the development and production of all unscripted series owned by Fox Entertainment (FAE), as well as programs FAE produces for third-party buyers in the U.S. and abroad, Hesling will be based in Los Angeles and report to Allison Wallach, president of unscripted programming at Fox Entertainment. “I am so excited for John to join FAE and lead the incredible team we have assembled,” Wallach said. “His creative vision and vast experience as both a producer and an executive working on a global scale will be key to our strategy of building FAE as a leading provider of innovative series and formats for Fox and third-party platforms throughout the world.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Nexstar is bringing together two of its prized properties this spring with the debut of a daily “The Hill” program on NewsNation. Chairman and CEO Perry Sook revealed that the long-gestating series based on the political news outlet, acquired by Nexstar in 2021, will premiere in April and run Monday-Friday. “Next steps for us, obviously, Elizabeth Vargas is going to the network in April,” Sook said. “And by the end of April we will have a program schedule that will be news 24/5. So we will be a 24-hour news network Monday-Friday by the end of April and that will include the daytime expansion, the addition of ‘The Hill,’ the addition of the ‘Elizabeth Vargas Reports’ show at 6 o’clock Eastern, Monday-Friday. And at that point, obviously, we’re getting higher cost per thousands in news programming than we did in off-network programming. We’ve been able to substantially grow our distribution revenue because of news content and being one of five networks rather than one of a hundred general entertainment networks.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Nexstar reported its fourth-quarter 2022 earnings Tuesday, revealing its core ad sales fell 3.3% from Oct. 1-Dec. 31, the quarter it finalized its purchase of the CW Network, but political ad revenue was up 1,306.9% due to the 2022 midterm elections. The TV station groups giant reported core advertising revenue at $477.5 million for the quarter, down from $493.7 million in the comparable 2021 period. Meanwhile, political ad sales were at a whopping $265.9 million versus $18.9 million last year. Overall, Nexstar’s total TV ad sales were up 45%, coming in at $743.4 million compared to $512.6 in Q4 2021.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers from “Poker Face” Episode 8, titled “The Orpheus Syndrome,” now streaming on Peacock. “Poker Face” took on a “Salvador Dali having a party with Alfred Hitchcock” vibe for its Episode 8 — directed and co-written by star Natasha Lyonne, who provided Variety with that delightful description for the installment, titled “The Orpheus Syndrome.” The Thursday episode of Rian Johnson’s hit Peacock howdunit followed Lyonne’s human lie-detector Charlie Cale in her latest murder mystery, guest starring Nick Nolte, Cherry Jones, Luis Guzmán, Tim Russ and Rowan Blanchard. This case, which ended up being a double homicide, hit her particularly hard after she grew very close to the second victim, a monster-movie maker named Arthur (played by Nick Nolte) whom she began working for in his creature-feature shop at the top of the episode. Arthur was murdered by Jones’ Laura, his former business partner who first killed her husband Max (Russ), after he discovered a dark secret from Arthur, Laura and Max’s early days making horror flicks together.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer HBO, HBO Max and Discovery+ added 1.1 million subscribers in Q4 to end 2022 with a total of 96.1 million worldwide. That’s up from the 95 million combined global streaming customers Warner Bros. Discovery hit from July 1-Sept. 30, the quarter during which the highly anticipated “Game of Thrones” prequel “House of the Dragon” debuted. During the Oct. 1-Dec. 31 quarter, “House of the Dragon” concluded its first season the second season of HBO’s hot Mike White drama “White Lotus” premiered. Details about the upcoming combined HBO Max-Discovery+ streamer — which does not yet have a name, launch date or pricing details — will be revealed at an April 12 press day.