SPIDEY closes in on AVATAR, but snow quiets slow Box Office overall

MOMOA joining FAST 10 / REED HASTINGS drops $20 mil on NETFLIX stock / SUNDANCE ends in flurry of deals

Jan 31, 2022

Mornin! This is Sean McNulty and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on MONDAY January 31, 2022.

Where your SUPER BOWL teams are the CINCY BENGALS and the LA RAMS, who… yes will be playing the game at home.

2nd year in a row a team is playing a home game for the the SUPER BOWL… even though most folks will be rooting for the BENGALS.

But the big question is… Whose idea it was to put the massive speaker system for the KANSAS CITY Halftime show right behind the CBS broadcast booth 🤯. #CantHearAthing

PLUS: A 🍻 to Rafael Nadal, who won his 21st Grand Slam at the AUSTRALIAN OPEN to take the record for most Grand Slam tournament wins ever.

ALSO: John Mulaney will return to host SNL for the 5th time when the show returns… in a month 😳 on Feb 26. LCD SOUNDSYSTEM will be the musical guest.

📽 THE SILVER SCREEN

BOX OFFICE

Obviously outside of NYC, Box Office was “muted” in the most populated areas of the Northeast this weekend. ❄️

“Spider-Man: No Way Home” : $11 Million ($736 Million US, $1.74 Billion global)
- A low 21% drop keeps the #BeatAvatar goal alive, now just $24 Million away.
- Looking at $610 Million in profit when all revenues tallied in (Home Entertainment, Cable TV sales etc).
  - Meaning DISNEY’s getting an approximately $150 Million profit check here for putting up 25% of the budget.
“Scream” : $7 Million ($62 Million US, $106 Million global)
“Sing 2”: $5 Million ($134 Million US)
- Another very low 17% drop weekend-to-weekend… even though it’s also on PVOD
“Redeeming Love”: $2 Million ($6.5 Million US)
“The King’s Man” : $1.75 million ($34 Million US)

ELSEWHERE AT THE BOX OFFICE

“Licorice Pizza” stays at $700k, now at $12 Million US total. /Deadline
“Nightmare Alley” had $530k from its 1000 theater re-expansion, US total stands at $10.3 Million
- Film hits HBOMAX and HULU on Tuesday

Jason Momoa joining “Fast & Furious 10” at UNI

No word on the role, will begin shooting this Spring for a May 2023 release. /THR

“Masters of the Universe” live-action pic moves from SONY to NETFLIX, sets Summer shoot start

Kyle Allen (“West Side Story”, upcoming PAR+ Joey King romance “The In-Between”) set as “He-Man”.

SONY is keeping CHINA distro rights. /Deadline

IN THE HOLLYWOOD EXECUTIVE SUITE

WME partner Holly Jeter departing to lead Halle Berry’s new production company 606 PRODUCTIONS. /Deadline

OVER AT SUNDANCE

HBOMAX buys Tig Notaro / Dakota Johnson SUNDANCE movie “Am I Ok?”, about a woman navigating coming out in her 30’s. No price disclosed. /Variety
NETFLIX buys global rights to SUNDANCE docu “Descendant” - centers on residents of Africatown, Alabama sharing personal stories and history as descendants of the Clotilda, the last known slave ship to illegally bring humans from Africa to America. Will be presented from The Obamas HIGHER GROUND label, no price disclosed. /THR
FOCUS FEATURES buys SUNDANCE pic “Brian and Charles”, about a lonely inventor in rural WALES who turns his washing machine into a talking robot… which is about as spot-on of a SUNDANCE movie description imaginable. No price disclosed. /Variety
IFC & SHUDDER buy psychological thriller “Resurrection” starring Rebecca Hall and Tim Roth. No price disclosed. /Variety
SHOWTIME buys docu “2nd Chance” about Richard Davis, inventor of the bulletproof vest… who #FunFact shot himself 192 times (In a row? #Clerks). Docu-Directorial debut of Ramin Bahrami (2020’s “The White Tiger”). No price disclosed. /Deadline

AND: Your 2022 SUNDANCE winners are….

GRAND JURY PRIZE SCRIPTED: “Nanny” (a horror-thriller about an immigrant woman building a new life in NYC as a nanny for an UES family).
GRAND JURY DOCU: “The Exiles” (about docu filmmaker Christine Choy who began but never finished a docu on the Tiananmen Square movement in 1989).
AUDIENCE AWARD SCRIPTED: “Cha Cha Real Smooth”
AUDIENCE AWARD DOCU + OVERALL FEST FAVORITE: “Navalny”

📺 THE TV SET

JUST THREE THINGS

FX ON HULU adds Adam Brody to “Fleischman is in Trouble” limited series, alongside Jesse Eisenberg, Clare Danes and Lizzy Caplan. He’ll play a friend of Eisenberg’s “Fleischman”. /THR

DISNEY+ adds Elizabeth Mitchell to “Santa Clause” limited series to reprise her Mrs Clause role from the movies. /Deadline
APPLE TV+ adds Diane Lane, Yara Shahidi (“black-ish”) and Murray Bartlett (“Armond” from “The White Lotus”) to their already star-studded environmentally-themed anthology series “Extrapoloations” from Scott Z. Burns (“Contagion”). /Variety
- This is the 3rd big project Bartlett has joined this month (the HULU Chippendales limited series, and Season 2 of “Physical” also at APPLE TV+).

💻 THE MEDIA BIZ

NETFLIX co-CEO Reed Hastings bought the dip on the company stock last week as well

He revealed late Friday that he bought $20 Million worth of stock on the premise that Wall Street has over-corrected its value too far in the negative direction. 📉

$NFLX is currently trading near a 2 year low, closing at $384 a share on Friday.

Reed was given $42 Million in stock options as part of his compensation in 2020. /Deadline

80% of the NFT’s people are minting on the OPEN SEA platform are fake or theft

It’s kinda reassuring to see the NFT biz showing behavior that is almost… exactly the same that people did with Music 25 years ago. #LimeWire

OPEN SEA created an ability to mint NFT’s for free, only paying a fee once they were actually sold and… lo and behold! Most folks have been minting NFT’s from other people’s art and copyright and OPEN SEA is uh… yeah revising the policy. /VICE

James Murdoch teaming up to make big media play in INDIA with VIACOM18

Just a #MediaNerd 🤓 read to kick off a busy Earnings week - #MediaJocks 🏋️‍♀️ feel free to scroll down to the “Halo” trailer.

The INDIA market continues to be the new hotbed of Media investment and activity. The basics on this one to get up to speed:

VIACOM18 is an INDIA network that VIACOM owns a 49% stake in, but it’s in 4th place in terms of the big networks in INDIA.

James Murdoch (the non-MAGA one) is teaming up with INDIA media titan Uday Shankar, and huge India conglomerate RELIANCE for a 40% stake in VIACOM18, investing about $1.6 Billion. VIACOM’s 49% stake would likely go down to about 10% as a result.

Uday launched STAR India, which was later bought by FOX, which was later bought by DISNEY, who turned it into DISNEY+ HOTSTAR which is aka over 35% of DISNEY+’s subscriber base.
RELIANCE is a massive company that also runs the biggest mobile service provider in India, JIO - which has attracted sizable investments from FACEBOOK and AMAZON among others.

They hope to create a formidable 3rd large competitor in the media space with VIACOM18, to take on DISNEY+ HOTSTAR (home of Cricket), and the newly formed ZEE & SONY INDIA merged powerhouse. Not to mention AMAZON PRIME and a newly-aggresssive-in-INDIA NETFLIX.

VIACOM18 is already building up an impressive global sports rights war chest, with the NBA, WORLD CUP, the big Soccer leagues in ITALY and SPAIN, and ATP (the pro Tennis circuit).

And if you’ve read my previous INDIA MediaBiz reads… you know that IPL Cricket TV rights are up for grabs this year (basically the NFL of INDIA).

So - that auction process just got a lot more interesting. At stake - the formidable DISNEY+HOTSTAR backbone in the DISNEY+ streaming numbers. /IndiaTimes

ALSO: GOOGLE just invested $1 Billion in INDIA’s 2nd largest mobile provider BHARTI AIRTEL with 300 Million customers. Although they invested $4.5 Billion in their main competitor, the above-mentioned JIO in 2020, who has over 400 Million customers. /TechCrunch

ALSO IN MEDIA

SPOTIFY said they’ll put a disclaimer tag on ~~Joe Rogan~~ any podcasts discussing Covid with a link to resources giving you the real science… that definitely contradicts whatever you’re about to listen to. 👍
- For the record, Rogan put out his own IG Video saying “I’m sorry” and that he’ll “do better” so that should do it. 🤝 SPOTIFY also definitely learning the lesson that paying Joe Rogan $100 Million is a way different scenario than not taking down R KELLY’s music.

🏦 STOCK NOTES:

Positive day for pretty much all Media stocks… the standouts:

APPLE +7% ($170.33)

DISCOVERY +7% ($27.15)

SNAP +7% ($30.42)

VIACOMCBS +5% ($32.97)

WARNER MUSIC +5% ($41.26)

FOX +5% ($36.71)

CHARTER +5% ($590.47)

and bizzaro stock CINEWORLD (REGAL Cinemas) -7% ($.50)

If you were sent this newsletter or… just kinda found it:

The Wakeup
Get the key Hollywood + Media Biz news to know by 8:30am EST each morning.
By Sean McNulty

👩‍💻 NEW TO WATCH:

NBC “Celebrating Betty White: America’s Golden Girl” - Airs at 10p

🕵️‍♀️ THE WEEK AHEAD

TUE - Letterman visits “Late Night” to celebrate 40 years of the franchise with Seth

SIRIUSXM earnings in the morning, GOOGLE earnings at 5p

WED - “Pam and Tommy” hits HULU

NY TIMES earnings in AM, SPOTIFY and FACEBOOK late afternoon

THU - SNAP, WWE, LIONSGATE, NEWS COPR and AMAZON report earnings after the bell

FRI - “Jackass Forever” hits theaters, OLYPMICS Opening Ceremony

🎥 TRAILER HOUSE

PARAMOUNT+ “Halo” series trailer - Premieres Thu March 24

SNL - Peyton Manning won the show with this on Saturday by far.

🎧 PLAYING ME OFF

New CHARLI XCX “Beg For You”

If you need some new tunes:

THE WAKEUP Spotify playlist

A Rest In Peace goes out to Howard Hessman who died at 81 years old. Even though WKRP leads the obits… he’ll always be Mr. Moore to me. #HeadOfTheClass

Email me anytime - just reply to this email, or connect here on LINKED IN.

-SEAN MCNULTY

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