Warner Bros. Discovery Layoffs: Streaming Marketing Latest Division To Be Hit

David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick will return to The Conjuring Universe as the screenwriter for The Conjuring 4, Deadline can confirm. The writer-producer had previously scripted installments including The Conjuring 2 (2016) and The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (2021).

In what has been heavily buzzed around town, Jesse Ehrman has been named President, Production and Development at Warner Bros. Pictures.

EXCLUSIVE: The $4.4 billion grossing producer of several Warner Bros. DC movies as well as the highest grossing horror franchise of all-time at $2 billion, The Conjuring, has re-upped with the Burbank, CA lot for another three years.

Warner Bros. Discovery has become the first major studio to sell a movie’s NFT bundle,with The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring dropping tomorrow.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Fanatical collectors of Peter Jackson’s “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring” will get the chance to buy limited-edition multimedia nonfungible token (NFT) versions of the fantasy epic. Warner Bros. Home Entertainment is teaming with blockchain company Eluvio to launch “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring” (Extended Version) Web3 Movie Experience, which will be available in two different editions that drop Friday, Oct. 21 at web3.wb.com. It’s the first time a major studio is releasing a movie as NFTs, which are unique identifiers that verify ownership of digital content. “The Fellowship of the Ring” NFTs are the first ones to be available in the “WB Movieverse,” a new marketplace that will in the future include other titles from the studio. Jessica Schell, GM and EVP, Warner Bros. Home Entertainment, said future releases are yet to be determined. On the platform, fans will be able to buy, sell and trade movie NFTs.

After 15 years at Warner Bros, and four as the President of DC Films, Walter Hamada has finally left the Burbank, CA lot as sources tell Deadline the exec waits for the senior Warner Discovery brass to finalize his exit payout. Hamada has run DC since 2018, and reupped in January 2021 with a contract that was supposed to take him through 2023.

Ahead of tomorrow’s tipoff of the 2022-23 NBA season, Warner Bros Discovery announced contract renewals for the four hosts of TNT’s mainstay studio show Inside the NBA.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Amazon Prime Video has scored a pair of deals with Warner Bros. Discovery and Sony to bolster its programming in France with premium titles. The agreement with Warner Bros. Discovery gives Prime Video the first-window rights to exclusive TV series from Warner Bros. Discovery in France, including “Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin,” the first two seasons of “The Sex Lives of College Girls,” Ava DuVernay’s miniseries “DMZ” and “Peacemaker” Season 1. Also part of the pact are library TV titles, on a non-exclusive basis. These include “Legacies” (Seasons 1 through 3), “Pretty Little Liars,” “Fringe,” “One Tree Hill,” “The Originals” and “Shameless.”

EXCLUSIVE: Warner Bros. Discovery is behind a TV show telling real life stories of people overcoming severe medical conditions to show human bravery, with Netflix’s Amazing on the Inside producer Future Studios and distributor TVF International shopping Unbelievable Me at Mipcom Cannes this week.

Does the world need a reimagining of the 1990 comedy “House Party“? It’s not like that movie is terrible, and it’s an early role for Martin Lawrence, but who remembers it nowadays? And what kind of audience is there today for a remake? Well, LeBron James thinks the comedy needs a revamp three decades later whether anyone asked for it or not. He, Maverick Carter, and Warner Bros.  Continue reading ‘House Party’ Red Band Trailer: LeBron James & Warner Bros.

Variety. “Leslie Grace was fantastic.

EXCLUSIVE: Jake Choi (Single Parents) has signed on to star alongside Lil Rel Howery, Yvonne Orji, John Cena and Meredith Hagner in 20th Century Studios’ Vacation Friends sequel Honeymoon Friends for Hulu.

Michael Schneider Variety Editor at Large Warner Bros. Discovery Global Kids, Young Adults and Classics chief marketing officer Tricia Melton is departing the company, along with Cartoon Network and Adult Swim senior VP of marketing and partnerships Jill King. Their exits rep the latest high-profile departures at the conglom as it continues to cut costs and downsize following the April acquisition of Warner Bros. by Discovery. Melton’s and King’s exits come just days after Warner Bros. TV Group’s animation division was hit hard by cuts — including the merger of development and main production teams for Warner Bros. Animation and Cartoon Network Studios. Both shingles remain, but with a smaller, merged headcount.  

Tricia Melton, Chief Marketing Officer of Warner Bros. Discovery Global Kids, Young Adults and Classics, and company veteran Jill King, SVP, Marketing and Partnerships, Cartoon Network and Adult Swim, will be leaving at the end of the year; the latest senior executives to depart Warner Bros. Discovery following the completion of the Discovery-WarnerMedia merger. News of the duo’s exit comes during a week that brought upon a new round of layoffs across WBD.

Michael Schneider Variety Editor at Large Warner Bros. Discovery’s decision to end its long-running writers and directors training program, which the conglom announced Tuesday as part of a series of layoffs and budget cuts at Warner Bros. TV Group, drew a strong rebuke from different parts of the industry, including a stinging statement on Wednesday by the Directors Guild of America. But what Warner Bros. Discovery hadn’t followed up to explain — and quickly revealed on Wednesday — is that its Writers Workshop and Directors Workshop will live on (albeit it, in a somewhat different form, details TBD) but now move from Warner Bros. Television and be housed inside the conglom’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion unit.

Warner Bros. Discovery has performed a quick U-turn on its decision to close its Writers and Directors Workshops.

Manori Ravindran International Editor Former Warner Bros. Discovery and OSN executives are teaming up to form a new content studio serving the Middle East and North Africa, Variety can reveal. Rise Studios is being set up by industry veterans Emad Morcos, former OSN chief content and commercial officer; Amanda Turnbull, former general manager at Warner Bros. Discovery Middle East, Africa and Turkey; and Amel Farag, former head of content commercial strategy at OSN. Rise will invest in local content and talent in order to launch homegrown film and TV productions on both regional and global broadcasters and streaming platforms.

EXCLUSIVE: Parul Agrawal, a longtime drama executive at Warner Brothers Television, has been promoted to SVP and head of drama development. Reporting to Clancy Collins White, EVP and Head Of Development, she succeeds Leigh London Redman, who left in July to become President of Berlanti Productions.

Joe Otterson TV Reporter Warner Bros. Television has promoted Parul Agrawal to the role of senior vice president and head of drama development, Variety has confirmed. Agrawal previously served as vice president of drama development. She tales over the role from Leigh London Redman, who exited the studio in July to join Berlanti Productions. Agrawal will report to Clancy Collins White, executive vice president and head of development. Agrawal originally joined WBTV in 2010, rising to vice president of drama development in 2019. During her tenure with the studio, she has helped develop shows like “Lovecraft Country” at HBO, “All American” and “All American: Homecoming” at The CW as well as “Batwoman,” “Black Lightning,” “Kung Fu” “Supergirl,” and the upcoming “Gotham Knights” at the broadcaster. Others include “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina” and “Maid” at Netflix as well as “Castle Rock” at Hulu and many more.