ViacomCBS: Last News

Kelsey Grammer is teasing the long-awaited revival could begin shooting this fall. ViacomCBS officially greenlit the Paramount+ series last February.

EXCLUSIVE: SEAL Team showrunner/executive producer Spencer Hudnut is expanding his relationship with CBS Studios, the studio behind the military drama series, with a new overall deal. SEAL Team is currently in production on its sixth season at Paramount+. SEAL Team, along with Evil, relocated to the ViacomCBS streaming service from CBS in May 2021, where it has ranked among the streamer’s most-watched dramas.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentRaffaele Annecchino, president of Paramount International Studios, Networks and Streaming, is leaving the company.A terse internal Paramount memo obtained by Variety says that JC Acosta, president, International Studios, Streaming and Networks for Southern Europe, Latin America, Middle East and Africa; Maria Kyriacou, president, Australia , Canada, Israel and UK; and Mark Specht, EVP and managing director, Central and Northern Europe and Asia, “will be stepping in as interim heads to lead the international business.”There was no immediate comment from Paramount International on Wednesday.As he rose through the ranks at what is now Paramount Annecchino is known to have had a close rapport with Paramount CEO Bob Bakish, but it appears that this rapport has suddenly gone sour.

Michael Schneider Variety Editor at LargeThe producers of “Live PD” are reviving the show’s live format on Reelz, but under a new working title: “On Patrol: Live” is set to premiere later this summer, the network announced Wednesday. Just like “Live PD,” the show will air live, twice a week (on Friday and Saturday nights from 9 p.m.

Anna Tingley If you purchase an independently reviewed product or service through a link on our website, Variety may receive an affiliate commission. A new “South Park” special arrives on Paramount+ this Wednesday.“The Streaming Wars,” which drops on June 1 at 12 a.m.

CBS — bringing the rest of Paramount with it — is back at its longtime upfront home, Carnegie Hall, and the network’s late-night host Stephen Colbert is back onstage ribbing his employer.

Cynthia Littleton Business EditorParamount Global’s stock price shot up more than 10% in early trading Tuesday following the news that Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has scooped up more than $2 billion worth of shares in the company in recent months.Paramount stock opened Tuesday at $28.47 after closing Monday at $28.02, before Berkshire Hathaway’s stock purchases were disclosed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing.Berkshire Hathaway has been in an investor in one of Paramount’s predecessor companies, Viacom, in the not-too-distant past. Buffett’s purchases of late suggest that he sees the company as under-valued, or that he expects the company to be involved in M&A .Paramount Global, which changed its corporate moniker from ViacomCBS earlier this year, has struggled with the conventional wisdom that the company is too small to compete in what is fast becoming a global content marketplace.

Paramount+ will welcome back yet another South Park special event when June rolls around.

Paramount Global shares were down about 1% midway through the trading day after the company reported a mixed bag of first-quarter results.

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentVivendi, the parent company of French pay TV company Canal Plus Group and advertising banner Havas Group, saw its revenues increase by 13.4% to €2.3 billion ($2.4 billion) during the first quarter of 2022.The company’s financial results were mainly driven by the growth of Canal Plus Group, Havas Group, as well the Vivendi Village, which is behind live events, and the video game outfit Gameloft. Results also took into account Prisma Media, the recently acquired publishing group.

Paramount Global is raising $1 billion in fresh cash through a bond sale expected to close March 29.

Paramount International boss Raffaele Annecchino has talked up the streamer for “launching quicker than others” in key European markets, as he unveiled a tied-up with global Lupin and Narcos production house Gaumont and set titles from France, Argentina and Germany.

Matt Donnelly Senior Film WriterSam Schles, a longtime creative executive under the ViacomCBS content umbrella, has joined Madica Productions.Schles has been named vice president of scripted development at the label — a spinoff of the prominent Hollywood PR agency Sunshine Sachs Morgan & Lylis — whose credits include the Netflix’s “Ginny and Georgia” and the Leonardo DiCaprio-produced digital series “Stay Wild.”Schles will report to Madica’s managing director Jeff Tahler. She began her career at Comedy Central, where she would eventually serve as director of talent and development.

Afternoon subscribers. Max Goldbart here with your weekly dose of International Insider news and analysis and it’s been as busy as ever over the past seven days. Scroll down for more.

The Girls On The Bus‘ long journey to the small screen has come to a successful conclusion with a straight-to-series order at HBO Max. The drama series adaptation of Amy Chozick’s best-selling book Chasing Hillary, from Julie Plec, Chozick, Berlanti Productions and Warner Bros. TV, originally landed at Netflix with a series order three years and moved to the CW for development earlier in this broadcast cycle.

the new Beavis And Butt-Head film, scheduled for release this year.The recent ViacomCBS Investors Event (February 15) covered a variety of news – including the announcement that ViacomCBS will now go under the Paramount name – among which were some updates on some of the company’s major upcoming projects.It was confirmed that the two-season order of the Beavis And Butt-Head TV show that was originally set to air on Comedy Central has changed, with a new season set to be featured as part of the Paramount+ SVOD (subscription video on demand) service.More than 200 remastered episodes of the original Beavis And Butt-Head series will also be available through Paramount+.The synopsis of the forthcoming movie – now officially titled Beavis And Butt-Head Do The Universe – reads: “In perhaps the dumbest space movie ever made, Beavis and Butt-Head are sentenced to Space Camp by a ‘creative’ judge in 1998. Their obsession with a docking simulator (huh huh) leads to a trip on the Space Shuttle, with predictably disastrous results.“After going through a black hole, they re-emerge in our time, where they look for love, misuse iPhones, and are hunted by the Deep State.

Yellowstone TV franchise is set to continue with 1932, as well as more of its other prequel series 1883.Yellowstone stars Kevin Costner, Wes Bentley, Kelly Reilly, Luke Grimes, Cole Hauser, and Gil Birmingham. The show follows the Dutton family, owners of the largest ranch in Montana, and various family dramas at the ranch and the bordering Broken Rock Indian Reservation, national park, and developers.1932 will see a new Yellowstone origin story set to follow a new generation of Duttons against the desolate backdrop of the Western expansion, Prohibition, and the Great Depression, according to Entertainment Weekly.Paramount+ has also announced more of spin-off show 1883, but did not confirm whether that would mean a renewal or more episodes.

Shares of ViacomCBS are down more than 20% in early trading as Wall Street digests the company’s streaming strategy, outlook and financials announced after the market closed Tuesday, and clearly has some issues.

Todd Spangler NY Digital EditorShares of Paramount, the new corporate name of ViacomCBS, took a dive after the media conglomerate told Wall Street that it was more aggressively equipping itself for battle in the streaming wars.The stock was down more than 15% in premarket trading Wednesday, coming a day after Paramount’s 2022 investor day presentation that detailed revised financial forecasts including a bigger capital outlay for its streaming strategy, led by Paramount Plus.Investors were apparently unnerved about the heavier investment Paramount plans to make in the streaming biz — it plans to boost spending on streaming content to $6 billion by 2024, versus $4 billion previously — and the resulting hit to profitability. Bank of America Securities analyst Jessica Reif Ehrlich downgraded her rating on the stock, from “buy” to “neutral,” and cut her 12-month price target on the stock from $52 to $39 per share.SEE ALSO: As ViacomCBS Becomes Paramount, an Energized Company Solidifies Its Streaming Playbook“We commend management for taking a bold approach, but near-term headwinds will drive Y/Y declines in CY22 and CY23 OIBDA [operating income before depreciation and amortization] and pressure already depressed FCF [free cash flow] levels,” Reif Ehrlich wrote in a note to clients.In reporting Q4 2021 results, the company said Paramount Plus netted 7.3 million new subscribers to stand at 32.8 million at year end.

Cynthia Littleton Business EditorIn their last outings as leaders of ViacomCBS, the executive team led by Shari Redstone and Bob Bakish finally started to sound like they have a solid plan to compete in streaming.On the day ViacomCBS unveiled its corporate rebrand to Paramount, starting as of Feb. 16, the company put on a nearly three-hour virtual presentation for investors that demonstrated how much its operations have been turned inside out to focus on streaming growth opportunities.

The CFO of ViacomCBS, soon to be known as Paramount, said Tuesday that the company is looking hard for “efficiencies” at its traditional businesses to divert as much cash it can to streaming, where investment will hit an estimated $6 billion in 2024.