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What's news: YouTube Premium is raising its prices. Jeff Shell could leave Paramount with a $5m payout. The Devil Wears Prada 2 is tracking to open at $66m. HBO has renewed the comedy Rooster. And FX has given a massive 3-season renewal to Welcome to Wrexham. — Abid Rahman
Do you have THR's next big story? Confidentially share tips with us at tips@thr.com. |
THR's Power Lawyers 2026►Hollywood’s top 100 attorneys. Even in Hollywood, nobody is above the law — even if you’re above the line. So if you’re a star, mogul or auteur who suddenly finds themselves on the wrong side of a contract dispute or a copyright infringement claim — or, God forbid, a subpoena in a case involving a Colleen Hoover adaptation — here are the 100 attorneys most likely to pull you out of hot water. The list.
—"We wanted to be particularly clear when we went to the marketplace about what it was about and why it was important, because this was a very personal story." For THR, Claudia Rosenbaum profiles Dan Limerick, the lawyer who helped seal one of the more extraordinary deals of the year, Ryan Coogler's pact with Warner Bros. that granted the director near eternal ownership over his Oscar-winning hit Sinners. The profile.
—How much!?!? Claudia Rosenbaum looks at what a top Hollywood lawyer will cost you these days. The answer? A lot. Get ready for some eye-popping invoices. The story.
—Legal Legends. Some entertainment lawyers close deals. These lawyers help define the business. THR’s Legal Legends honor recognizes attorneys whose work has left a lasting mark on Hollywood and the law. Here are the six joining the club in 2026. The story. |
Should AI-Assisted Shows Be Eligible for Emmys?►"It’d be nice to define a clear line that people could agree on." With Emmys season looming, the TV Academy wanted to avoid controversy over the use issue of AI in projects. Hoping to clarify what will be in and out of bounds for this year’s nominees, the group in January added a statement to the rules for the upcoming season: The academy, it said, reserves the "right to inquire about the use of AI in submissions." But the organization undercut that vigilance with another line — “The core of our recognition remains centered on human storytelling, regardless of the tools used to bring it to life.” THR's Hilary Lewis reports that far from clearing up confusion, the provisions have sparked criticism from numerous TV writers and producers, who think the guidelines leave far too much room for AI to have a meaningful role on writing, acting and other creative disciplines. The story.
—Shell game. Jeff Shell may be exiting Paramount Skydance, but he won’t be leaving empty-handed. A securities filing Thursday laid out the terms of his exit as president of the company, which also unveiled a major restructuring of its debt connected to the Warner Bros. Discovery mega-deal. Shell’s separation agreement, which was filed Thursday morning, calls for cash payments equal to the salary and target bonus he would be eligible for, spread over the next 12 months. Shell’s contract calls for a $3.5m salary and $1.5m target bonus, so the cash payment should be in the ballpark of $5m. The story.
—"One of the highest golden parachute estimates ever observed." The influential shareholder proxy advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services recommended that WBD shareholders reject the golden parachute pay packages for CEO David Zaslav and other top executives at the company, noting the “extraordinary” nature of the agreements. But ISS also urged shareholders to approve WBD’s sale to Paramount Skydance. Instead, ISS focuses on Zaslav’s potential $886m payout, a big chunk of which is composed of what ISS calls a “problematic” excise tax gross-up approved by the board last month. The story.
—Thanks Trump! For the first time in three years, YouTube is hiking the subscription prices for its YouTube Premium plans, the streaming giant said Friday. The core YouTube Premium plan will rise by $2 per month to $15.99, with the Music and Premium Lite plans rising by $1 per month to $11.99 and $8.99 respectively. The family plan is rising by $4 per month to $26.99, but allows for up to six people in the same household to have access. YouTube Premium gives its subscribers a number of features, but the core elements are ad-free videos, background play, and offline downloads. The story. |
'Metal Gear Solid' Movie in the Works►"Kept you waiting, huh?" THR's Borys "Skewpz" Kit has the big scoop that Final Destination: Bloodlines filmmaking duo Zach Lipovsky and Adam B. Stein will direct Sony’s Columbia Pictures adaptation of Metal Gear Solid, the pioneering video game created by Hideo Kojima. It would mark the first time the blockbuster title, a stealth combat game with sci-fi and spy features, would be brought to the screen. The MGS deal deepens Lipovsky and Stein’s relationship with Sony, where they are already developing multiple projects, including an animated Venom movie for Sony Pictures Animation, which they are directing. They are also developing the original sci-fi epic The Earthling for Columbia, which they are attached to direct and produce. The story.
—Who needs superheroes? David Frankel’s follow up to The Devil Wears Prada is looking like a box office fashionista all these years later — good enough, in fact, to launch the summer moviegoing season. The movie officially came on tracking Thursday, with one leading research firm predicting it could earn as much as $66m when it opens domestically over the May 1-3 weekend. THR's Pamela McClintock writes that's a strong number for a non-family title targeting females of all ages. Generally speaking, fanboy titles mark the start of the season and, specifically, Marvel superhero pics. The box office report.
—π€ Sold! π€ THR forest sprite Ryan Gajewski has the scoop that Inaugural Entertainment has acquired writer-director Lee Kirk's feature New Years Rev, that has now been retitled Nimrods . The Live Nation Studios film is a coming-of-age film centering on three high school friends who set out on a wild road trip under the mistaken assumption that their fledgling band has been booked to open for Green Day on New Year’s Eve. The story is based on Green Day’s real-life adventures while living in a van before the success of Dookie. Premiering at TIFF 2025, Nimrods stars Mason Thames, Mckenna Grace, Jenna Fischer, Angela Kinsey, Sean Gunn, Bobby Lee and Fred Armisen. The story.
—π Edging closer. π James Gunn is getting close to finding his Maxima for Man of Tomorrow. Adria Arjona, Eva De Dominici, Sydney Chandler and Grace Van Patten are the four finalists for the role, sources tell THR. The actors tested this week in Atlanta, where Gunn is in prep for his Superman sequel. Writer Roger Stern and artist George PΓ©rez introduced Maxima in the pages of Action Comics No. 645 in 1989. She is an alien queen who has been both an antagonist and potential love interest for Superman. The story. |
'Rooster' Renewed for S2 at HBO►Crowing for another seaon. HBO has renewed the comedy Rooster, starring Steve Carell and created by Bill Lawrence and Matt Tarses, for a second season. The pickup comes halfway through the show’s 10-episode first season, which centers on the relationship between an author (Carell) and his college professor daughter (Charly Clive). Rooster has performed well for HBO and HBO Max so far, averaging 5.8m cross-platform viewers per episode since its March 8 premiere. The Warner Bros. TV series is on pace to be HBO’s most watched first-year comedy in more than a decade. The story.
—π’ Greenest of green lights. π’ Amazon Prime Video has given a straight-to-series order for Calamities, a Texas-set crime thriller from Hunters creator David Weil. Glen Powell is also among the executive producers (and will have a strictly behind-the-scenes role in the project). Amazon MGM Studios is producing. Weil is the creator, writer and showrunner of Calamities. The logline for the show reads, “After a drug deal explodes into violence, a quiet border town is thrust into a deadly collision course between a small-town sheriff looking for answers from her past, a sociopathic hit woman, an overly eager FBI agent, and a ruthless sect of the cartel.” The story.
—π’ One in, one out. π’ CBS is adding a comedy to its lineup for the 2026-27 season. The network has given a series order to Eternally Yours, a show about a family of vampires. The series comes from Ghosts showrunners Joe Port and Joe Wiseman and CBS Studios. CBS also announced that it’s not going forward with a second comedy pilot, The Tillbrooks, a multicamera comedy starring Rhys Darby and Kate Walsh from creator Tara Hernandez. The story.
—π Leading man found. π Kevin Bacon will star in Hulu’s drama pilot Southern Bastards, based on a graphic novel of the same name by Jason Aaron and Jason LaTour. The pilot comes from Disney’s Onyx Collective, POV Entertainment and Ryan Coogler’s Proximity Media in association with Fifth Season. Along with Bacon, King Richard helmer Reinaldo Marcus Green has joined the pilot as director. Southern Bastards will follow “a tenacious military vet into Craw County, Alabama, in search of her estranged father,” the logline reads. “What she finds is a murderous hornet’s nest of organized crime run by the winningest high school football coach in the South.” Bill Dubuque and Nia DaCosta share story credit on the pilot, with Dubuque writing the teleplay. Matt Olmstead will serve as showrunner. The story. |
'Welcome to Wrexham' Lands 3-Season Renewal at FX►π΄σ §σ ’σ ·σ ¬σ ³σ Ώ The Premier League years? π΄σ §σ ’σ ·σ ¬σ ³σ Ώ FX will be hanging around the Wrexham AFC pitch for the rest of the 2020s. The Disney-owned outlet has given a three-season pickup to Welcome to Wrexham, the docuseries from Rob Moc and Ryan Reynolds about the Welsh soccer club, its fans and its city. The renewal comes a little ahead of its season five premiere, set for May 14, and will take the show through its eighth installment, likely in 2029. The story.
—π Congrats to all! π Heated Rivalry, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, The Pitt, Mussolini: Son of the Century, Pluribus, The Rehearsal and Death by Lightning are among the nominees for the 2026 Peabody Awards. Additional noteworthy nominees include Adolescence, Andor, Dying for Sex, Mo, Forever and Sly Lives! (a.k.a. The Burden of Black Genius). The organization’s board of jurors announced the nominations across its arts, children’s/youth, entertainment and interactive and immersive categories after revealing the documentary, news, public service and radio/podcast nominees on Tuesday. The nominees.
—π Trent Crimm from The Independent! π On Thursday, Netflix revealed a trio of new guest stars for Wednesday season three. Lena Headey, Andrew McCarthy and James Lance have joined the smash-hit show. Production on the third season is currently underway near Dublin. Previously announced season three cast members include Eva Green, Winona Ryder, Chris Sarandon, Noah Taylor, Oscar Morgan and Kennedy Moyer. And of course, the main Addams clan return: Jenna Ortega as Wednesday Addams, Catherine Zeta-Jones as Morticia Addams and Luis GuzmΓ‘n as Gomez Addams. The story.
—BRAAAM! Rapper, singer and producer Labrinth is not featured on the music for season 3 of Euphoria, with Hans Zimmer taking the composer duties on his own. Zimmer had previously been confirmed to be collaborating with Labrinth for the show’s music, though the notion that Labrinth would participate became murkier a month ago, after he posted a cryptic message online blasting both the show and his record label Columbia Records, writing that “I’m done with this industry.” The story.
—Straw Hat supremacy. Netflix’s One Piece returned from more than two years away to its best weekly streaming total, and Scarpetta had a solid opening week for Prime Video. Both shows, however, took a back seat to the streaming debut of Zootopia 2. The animated sequel drew 1.72b minutes of viewing time for Disney+ in the week of March 9-15. Zootopia 2 also gave a boost to its predecessor; Zootopia’s 381m viewing minutes were more than double its total for the previous week. On Nielsen’s streaming series charts, One Piece scored 1.62b minutes of viewing with the premiere of its second season. That’s a series high; its previous best was 1.39b minutes in September 2023, a week after its first season debuted. Virgin River (1.39b minutes) also returned to the rankings with the premiere of its seventh season. The streaming rankings. |
TV Review: 'Malcolm in the Middle: Life's Still Unfair'►"More like Malcolm: Portrait of a Serial Killer than you expect." THR's chief TV critic Daniel Fienberg reviews Hulu's Malcolm in the Middle: Life's Still Unfair. The core cast and creator are back for a limited series that picks up with the dysfunctional clan 20 years later. Starring Bryan Cranston, Frankie Muniz, Jane Kaczmarek, Christopher Kennedy Masterson, Justin Berfield, Emy Coligado, Keeley Karsten, Vaughan Murrae, Kiana Madeira and Caleb Ellsworth-Clark. Created by Linwood Boomer. The review.
—"Decidedly meager." THR's chief film critic David Rooney reviews Jonah Hill's Outcome . A star-studded cast appear in this Apple TV feature, an inside-showbiz satire about an extortion scheme that prompts a fretful apology tour. Starring Keanu Reeves, Jonah Hill, Cameron Diaz, Matt Bomer, Susan Lucci, Laverne Cox, David Spade, Martin Scorsese, Atsuko Okatsuka, Roy Wood Jr., Welker White, Kaia Gerber, Ivy Wolk and Drew Barrymore. Written by Jonah Hill and Ezra Woods. The review.
—"An easily digestible blend of slick and stupid." David reviews Tommy Wirkola's Thrash. Apex predators ignore the evacuation order in Wirkola’s climate change disaster film for Netflix. Starring Phoebe Dynevor, Whitney Peak, Djimon Hounsou, Matt Nable, Andrew Lees, Stacy Claussen, Alyla Browne and Dante Ubaldi. Written by Tommy Wirkola. The review. |
Thank Pod It's Friday
►All the latest content from THR's podcast studio.
—Awards Chatter. THR's executive awards editor Scott Feinberg talks to the great and the good of Hollywood. In this live episode Scott spoke to Harrison Ford. The legendary star reflects on how clinical depression led him to acting, the unlikely ways he broke into the movies and was cast in Star Wars, why he long yearned to escape "leading man" roles and to play "character parts" and why he so loves his current challenge of playing an acerbic psychotherapist battling Parkinson's disease on Apple TV's Emmy-nominated comedy Shrinking. The podcast.
—Awards Chatter. In this episode Scott spoke to David Puttnam. The Oscar-winning producer of films like Chariots of Fire, Local Hero, The Killing Fields and The Mission, who was once described by the New York Times as "the white knight of the British film industry," and who later became the first non-American to run a Hollywood studio, reflects on his path from school dropout to ad industry phenom to filmmaking; why he so often bet on first-time directors, non-star actors and character-driven dramas; and his brief and turbulent time running Columbia Pictures. The podcast.
—It Happened in Hollywood. THR senior writer Seth Abramovitch goes behind the scenes of the pop culture moments that shaped Hollywood history. In this episode, Seth spoke to Amy Heckerling. The director reveals how she transformed Cameron Crowe’s undercover reporting into the classic film Fast Times at Ridgemont High, a defining portrait of messy, horny, sun-bleached youth. The podcast.
In other news...
—Paramount’s My Killer Father: The Green Hollow Murders trailer seeks dozens of dead bodies
—Pink to host Tony Awards
—How Sabrina Carpenter’s music videos are all subtly connected
—Jon Schlosberg named exec producer of ABC News’ This Week
—Kyle Hawley named president of Fargo outfit 26 Keys
—Colette Watson, Rogers Sports & Media president, to retire after 35 years
—Liza Burnett Fefferman joins Anonymous Content in chief comms role
What else we're reading...
—Humza Jilani, Abigail Hauslohner and Demetri Sevastopulo report that Trump was kinda begging for a ceasefire with Iran from March 21st onwards [FT]
—Ellie Quinlan Houghtaling reports that the Pentagon threatened the Pope after he criticized Trump [The New Republic]
—Lane Brown looks at what extreme wealth does to the brain [Intelligencer]
—Alexandra Alter digs into the AI problems stalking the publishing industry and where those issues leave authors and readers [NYT]
—Here's your Friday list: Every Adult Swim series, ranked [Vulture]
Today...
...in 2014, Warner Bros. Pictures released fantasy thriller Lost River in theaters. Written and directed by Ryan Gosling, his debut as a filmmaker, the film starred Christina Hendricks, Saoirse Ronan, Iain De Caestecker, Matt Smith, Ben Mendelsohn, Barbara Steele, and Eva Mendes. After premiering in Cannes, the film was savaged by critics. The original review.
Today's birthdays: Charlie Hunnam (46), Daisy Ridley (34), Barkhad Abdi (41), David Harbour (51), Mandy Moore (42), Jamie Chung (43), Steven Seagal (74), Alex Pettyfer (36), Michael Pitt (45), Peter MacNicol (72), Laura Bell Bundy (45), Sofia Carson (33), Haley Joel Osment (38), Chyler Leigh (44), Pej Vahdat (44), Ryan Merriman (43), Orlando Jones (58), Harry Hadden-Paton (45), AJ Michalka (35), Billy Jayne (57), Omar Metwally (52), Guillaume Canet (53), Molly Bernard (38), Sarah Dumont (36), Jamie RenΓ©e Smith (39), Rainbow Wedell (25), Conor Leslie (35), Sandrine Pinna (39), Ruby Jerins (28), Jasika Nicole (46), Ava Michelle (24), Deborah Rush (72), Stephanie Sheh (49), Cara DeLizia (42), Shin Hyun-been (40), Ian Nelson (31), Natasha Melnick (42)
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