Nexstar: Last News

Nexstar Media Group, which has long been known for its enviable balance sheet and knack for finding ways to economize, plans to fund its investment in The CW with proceeds from its sale of a Chicago property to a casino developer.

Nexstar CEO Perry Sook and execs of the nation’s biggest broadcaster said its imprimatur will be evident on The CW schedule for the 2023-2024 season with lower cost, broader appeal, and more unscripted fare and minimal content from former co-owners Warner Brothers Discovery and Paramount Global.

Nexstar grew revenue 9.7% for the September quarter to $1.29 billion for the three months ended in September, as the new CW owner cited growth in political advertising, distribution and digital revenue.

Not counting the series that are officially ending this season, the oldest scripted series on the air at the CW is flagship All American, currently in its fifth season. All other shows are three-years-old or younger. That is significant as series tend to get more expensive as they age.

Less than a month after Nexstar Media closed a deal to take 75% ownership of The CW, the broadcast network has been hit with dozens of layoffs.

EXCLUSIVE: Faced with their first decision on ordering more of the CW’s existing scripted series, the network’s new Nexstar owners opted against it. I hear there will be no back orders for the CW’s new fall series, Walker: Independence, from CBS Studios, and The Winchesters, from Warner Bros. Television, whose freshman seasons will remain at the original 13 episodes.

EXCLUSIVE: The new iteration of The CW is starting to take shape.

Paul Hewitt is the latest long-term exec leaving The CW.

DC’s Stargirl is coming to an end. The series will conclude with its third season, which is currently airing on The CW.

The end is in sight for the CW’s Nancy Drew. The network confirmed Wednesday that the fourth season, which is currently in production, will be the last for the series. Season 4 is slated to premiere midseason. A premiere date and time will be announced later.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer We’re almost a month into the broadcast TV fall 2022 season and we’ve already got a few winners and losers to discuss when it comes to new scripted series. There are multiple ways to categorize a victory in the this ever-evolving TV landscape, but for the purposes of this story looking at the debuts of NBC, CBS, ABC, Fox and The CW’s new shows, Variety has ranked the programs by the total viewers that each series premiere racked up, according to Nielsen’s Live + Same Day data.

Less than a day after the announcement that Mark Pedowitz would leave the CW, the cast and creator of The Winchesters took time to honor the chairman and CEO who championed their Supernatural spinoff.

Two senior executives at the CW — Rick Haskins, president of streaming and chief branding officer, and finance chief Mitch Nedick — are departing the network as Nexstar assumes control.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor After spending several years setting the pace of “The Flash” and other hard-racing TV superheroes on the CW network, Mark Pedowitz has reached the end of his current adventure. The longtime TV executive, who has run the one-time joint venture between CBS and Time Warner since 2011, is leaving the network as Nexstar Media Group prepares to acquire the outlet, which has its roots in two antecedent networks, UPN and The WB, that both catered to younger viewers. Nexstar is expected to close the deal at some point in the third quarter of 2022, but has already begun to run the network’s operations. Dennis Miller, a longtime TV executive who eventually moved into the world of venture capital, will take the reins as president of CW. Miller has served on Nexstar’s board of directors for the past few years.

Mark Pedowitz is stepping down as Chairman and CEO of the CW after eleven and a half years at the helm of the broadcast network, one of the longest tenures in network television. The move comes as local TV giant Nexstar Media Group is taking over the CW, with its acquisition of 75% stake in the 16-year-old broadcast operation now completed. He will be replaced by Dennis Miller who was named President, confirming new owners’ intention to take the CW in a different direction. 

Nexstar Media Group has formally closed a deal to acquire 75% interest in the broadcast network. Mark Pedowitz, the longtime CEO of the network and its face to the industry for the past 11 years, is stepping down after a brief transition period.

EXCLUSIVE: By the time the Nexstar Media Group’s long-in-the-works 75% acquisition of the CW finally closed earlier this month, it was the height of pitch season, when broadcast networks buy scripted projects to develop as new series for next season.

When Warner Bros Discovery CEO David Zaslav wanted to make a forceful first impression at the company’s upfront last spring, he used words designed to dazzle the audience of ad buyers.

The CW was only founded 16 years ago, and throughout that short life, it’s been known as both the youngest broadcaster and the broadcaster with the youngest audience. That’s why when Nexstar COO and president Tom Carter stated during a conference call Monday that the average viewer of the network, which is being acquired by the TV station group giant, is 58 years old, the internet had a hard time swallowing the stat.How is it possible that the average viewer of the home of YA-centric content like “Riverdale,” “All American,” “Walker” and “The Flash” is in their late 50s?But as Variety has independently confirmed with measurements from Nielsen, the Nexstar exec was correct: the median age for the CW’s primetime viewer throughout the 2021 calendar year was 57.4, according to Live + 7 Day data.

A massive change. Nexstar’s acquisition of The CW was in talks for months before the decision was officially made this summer — and there has been plenty of concern about what this means for the network’s programming.

During a call with analysts today, executives from Nexstar Media Group revealed how they hope to turn the CW into more of a cost-conscious broadcast network that appeals to a broader audience. Turns out the CW is a lot closer to that goal than anyone might have imagined.