Warner Bros. 100th Anniversary Kicks Into High Gear With All April TCM Movie Programming Devoted To The Studio

Selome Hailu The Roy kids may still be at war with their father, but at least they’ve got the support of the viewing public. The Season 4 premiere brought in 2.3 million viewers on Sunday. This number comes from a combination of Nielsen’s measurement of the episode’s linear viewers on HBO’s cable channel and Warner Bros. Discovery’s first-party data about streams on HBO Max through the night. There’s cause to celebrate for HBO, as 2.3 million marks a 33% improvement from the previous series high, which came when the Season 3 finale achieved 1.7 million viewers in December 2021. And compared to the premiere episode of Season 3, Season 4 returned with 62% more viewers.

EXCLUSIVE: Smokehouse Pictures partner George Clooney and Grant Heslov have signed an overall film deal with the Warner Bros. Pictures Group and its Co-Chairs and CEOs Mike De Luca and Pam Abdy. It amounts to a homecoming for the filmmakers, who named their company for the Smoke House steak joint right off the Warner Bros lot, where they used to eat all the time. Clooney’s history with the studio goes back to his breakthrough starring role in the Warner Bros Television drama ER. They made their first deal at Warner Bros when they formed Smokehouse in 2006.

EXCLUSIVE: In one of the wildest book rights auctions the town has seen in some time, Warner Bros. production co-heads Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy tonight landed screen rights to the upcoming T.J. Newman novel Drowning: The Rescue Of Flight 1421. Studio paid $1.5 million against $3 million, and there were five seven-figure bids on the table, sources said.    

Ellise Shafer Enter the Snyderverse: Director Zack Snyder is hosting a three-day celebration of his films in April to benefit the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. The weekend of screenings will take place on April 28-30, with all proceeds going to AFSP in honor of his daughter, Autumn Snyder, who died at the age of 20 in 2017. The three-day event will include director’s cuts of Snyder’s films followed by in-person and livestreamed Q&As with Snyder and special guests. The movies that will be shown include 2013’s “Man of Steel,” 2016’s “Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice Ultimate Edition” and 2021’s “Zack Snyder’s Justice League.” Screenings will take place in Los Angeles at the Ahmanson Auditorium at ArtCenter College of Design on April 28 and 29, with a third screening on April 30 at Universal Cinema AMC at CityWalk Hollywood. Snyder earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Film from ArtCenter in 1989 and serves on the college’s board of trustees.

Todd Gilchrist editor Warner Bros. will commemorate its 100th anniversary with a block of programming on Turner Classic Movies starting April 1. TCM will broadcast remastered and newly restored versions of 10 classic Warner Bros. films, each featuring an introduction from a filmmaker or film expert culled from the network’s ongoing partnership with the Film Foundation, a non-profit preservation and exhibition organization. The program coincides with the April 13-16 run of the TCM Classic Film Festival in Hollywood. On April 13, a new 4K restoration of 1959’s “Rio Bravo,” Howard Hawks’ classic western starring John Wayne, Dean Martin, Ricky Nelson and Angie Dickinson, will premiere on TCM and serve as the opening night film of the festival. Dickinson will attend the in-person event, while Martin Scorsese will introduce the film on TCM’s small-screen presentation. Similarly, Warner Bros. will premiere a new 4K restoration of Elia Kazan’s “East of Eden,” starring James Dean, on both the big screen and the network, the latter featuring an introduction by filmmakers Wes Anderson and Joanna Hogg.

William Earl Variety is pleased to announce additional speakers for its annual Entertainment Marketing Summit, presented by Deloitte, on April 19 in Los Angeles, including Christian Parkes, CMO, Neon; Catherine Halaby, head of entertainment, North America, TikTok; Deon Graham, chief brand officer, Combs Global; and Rachel Delphin, CMO, Twitch. Parkes and Halaby will join a Keynote Entertainment Marketing Leaders panel, also including Karen Bronzo, CMO, Warner Bros. Discovery; Dwight Caines, president, domestic marketing, Universal Pictures; and Marc Weinstock, president, worldwide marketing and distribution, Paramount Pictures. Graham, who oversees campaigns for Sean Combs’ businesses such as Revolt TV and Cîroc Vodka, will join a multicultural marketing conversation featuring Ellene V. Miles, SVP intersectional marketing, Sony Pictures Entertainment/ Motion Picture Group; Christine Benitez, SVP multicultural marketing, Paramount Pictures; and Claudia Chagui, SVP marketing and creative, NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises.

Sophia Scorziello editor “Indian Matchmaking” Season 3 will premiere April 21 on Netflix, the streamer announced Tuesday. Mumbai’s matchmaker Sima Taparia returns to help single millennials around the world find love, employing decades-worth of experience and traditional methods. This season, Sima’s matchmaking touch will reach from New York to New Delhi, Miami to London, as well as clients both old and new.  “Indian Matchmaking” premiered its first season in July 2020. The show is executive produced by Aaron Saidman, Eli Holzman, Smriti Mundhra and J.C. Begley. Check out some first looks of season three below.  Also in today’s TV news:

Fathom Events and Warner Bros are teaming to re-release the extended edition of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, bringing the blockbuster back to theaters in commemoration of its 20th anniversary.

Netflix has tapped Academy Award nominee Jon Spaihts (Dune: Part One & Two) to pen its live-action Gears of War film, based on the hit video game series, Deadline can confirm.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer HGTV is about to make Barbie fans’ dreams come true with the ultimate home-reno series based on everyone’s favorite doll: “Barbie Dreamhouse Challenge.” Premiering this summer, the Ashley Graham-hosted four-episode event is launching ahead of the July 21 release of Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” movie as part of a giant cross-network promotion across Warner Bros. Discovery linear channels to support the much-anticipated Warner Bros. Pictures film. “Barbie Dreamhouse Challenge” will feature eight teams of HGTV superstars (and one Food Network star) as they transform a Southern California home into a real-life Barbie Dreamhouse, as supermodel Graham — who has her own Barbie modeled after her and will be driving a Barbie pink corvette on the show — hosts. The teams will overhaul areas of the home with an era-specific style, such as an early 1960s atomic age kitchen, a ‘70s disco vibe for Ken’s Den and a main bedroom decked out in ‘80s glam.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Warner Bros. Discovery is giving a league of would-be providers of TV-audience measurement its own appraisal. After tapping Comscore, iSpot.TV and VideoAmp last year to help build a new suite of technologies that will help count viewers across linear, digital and connected television, the big entertainment company is paring down its provider list. Comscore and VideoAmp will serve as partners during Warner Bros. Discovery’s efforts during the industry’s next “upfront” sales session. “Our methodology was quite rigorous,” says Andrea Zapata, the company’s executive vice president and head of ad sales research, measurement and insights, in an interview.

Nancy Meyer‘s new rom-com might get a green light at Warner Bros after Netflix pulled the plug on it.

What’s David Robert Mitchell been up to lately? Well, since “Under The Silver Lake,” not much, but that’s about to change. Deadline reports that Mitchell has his next project lined up at Warner Bros., and the director is teaming up with Anne Hathaway and the Bad Robot crew for a new mystery project.

Anne Hathaway (Eileen) has signed on to star in a mysterious new film that David Robert Mitchell (It Follows, Under the Silver Lake) will direct for Warner Bros. Pictures, Bad Robot and Jackson Pictures.

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.)

Just days after parting ways with Netflix, Nancy Meyers next movie has found a new home as sources tell Deadline Warner Bros. is in early talks to acquire the project. Sources stress no deal is done and they are exploratory talks but add there is something to it and discussions have begun on various details about project. Deadline reported on Tuesday that the film was leaving Netflix after the studio pulled the plug due to budget concerns. Meyers moved quickly to take the project out to other studios and Warner Bros. is looking like the front-runner to land the film. Meyers will write and direct the project but what is unknown is if the all-star cast will still be joining. Meyers was in talks with Scarlett Johansson, Penelope Cruz, Owen Wilson and Michael Fassbender to star but given that was the plan when Meyers had a much larger budget it is unknown if those actors stay committed to the project.

Brent Lang Executive Editor Warner Bros. Discovery U.S. Hispanic has partnered with GroupM and Cocina Media on “El Toque de Aarón.” The all-new original seriesfollows celebrity chef Aarón Sánchez and his team as they help Latino restaurants in the Los Angeles area reach new heights. Kimberly Clark’s VivaÒ Paper Towels Brand will be an integrated sponsor, with other GroupM clients featured throughout the series. Sánchez will also act as an executive producer. The six-part series unfolds in Latino restaurants with great potential, ready to seize the opportunity to optimize their business – from devising a more exciting menu to improving the overall aesthetics to streamlining their execution and raising their public profile. Sánchez will help reimagine these restaurants to bring out their true soul, with a revamped menu and a refreshed space. In each 30-minute episode, the culinary wizard will put his personal touch on each menu item, while mentoring each restaurant’s chef and sharing tips and tricks of the trade along the way. Helping to round out the renewals with much-needed renovations are designer Cris Mercado (“HGTV Star; Remodelaciones con Celebridades“) and project manager Ángel Riveros (“Hogar Star”). Complicating matters is the fact that they have only four days to achieve this mission. The clock is ticking.

EXCLUSIVE: Illumination/Universal/Nintendo’s Super Mario Bros Movie just landed on tracking this morning ahead of its Easter weekend release, and the animated film is shaping up to make at least $85M-$90M+ over its Wednesday through Sunday launch and that’s on the conservative side.

Sunday’s Academy Awards ceremony when a teaser clip of the live-action version of “The Little Mermaid” aired during the telecast.The two-minute-long trailer debuted when the film’s stars Melissa McCarthy and Halle Bailey presented it onstage at the Dolby Theatre.Disney is said to have forked over $10 million to unveil the ad during the ABC broadcast, according to IndieWire — much higher than the cost of a 30-second spot which runs “between $1.6 million and $2.1 million.”ABC is a flagship property of Disney, but the House of Mouse actually paid the network $10 million to show the “Little Mermaid” ad spot during the Oscars. “Actual money actually changed hands,” the outlet reported, with a source saying the media companies are generally treated like “church and state.”According to Variety, Disney sold all of its ad spots — typically 60 to 70 commercial slots — for between $1.6 million and $2.1 million.“The Little Mermaid” used five 30-second spots for the trailer which is why it cost about three times as much for the Oscars sneak peek, an insider told IndieWire.Pfizer, Sony, Starbucks, Rolex and Verizon are among the brands which bought commercial time during the 2023 Academy Awards.Elsewhere in the show, Morgan Freeman and Margot Robbie also presented a 90-second Warner Bros.

A big feature of the TCM Classic Film Festival is providing world premieres of major restorations of some of those classics. This year’s 14th annual fest is no different as Turner Classic Movies has announced its opening night, April 13, will feature the premiere of a 4K restoration of Howard Hawk’s 1959 Western Rio Bravo, in partnership with Martin Scorsese’s Film Foundation, as part of the yearlong celebration of Warner Bros’ 100th anniversary.

Warner Bros. Studio Tour Tokyo – The Making of Harry Potter has set a June 16 date for the official opening. Tickets go on sale beginning March 22.