What's news: Disney+ tops 28 million subscribers as the company beats Wall Street expectations, Spotify buys Bill Simmons' The Ringer, Hollywood studios build a content war chest amid strike concerns, three big stars plot their returns to TV, President Trump's made-for-TV State of the Union address. Plus: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar on the "disturbing familiarity" of the best picture Oscar nominees, and an anonymous Academy member shares their "brutally honest" ballot. --Alex Weprin

 Disney Domination

►Disney's big quarter: Fueled by the box office successes of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and Frozen 2, each of which have exceeded $1 billion worldwide, Walt Disney's quarterly financial results beat the expectations of Wall Street on Tuesday, causing shares of the $262 billion entertainment conglomerate to rise slightly in after-hours trading. The numbers.

+The Disney+ numbers: The company also revealed what Wall Street was eagerly looking out for, new subscription numbers for Disney+. 28.6 million people have subscribed to the streaming service, with Hulu hitting 30.4 million subs between its on-demand and live TV offerings, and ESPN+ hitting 6.6 million subscribers. Natalie Jarvey has more.

+Star Wars spinoffs and Marvel dates: Disney CEO Bob Iger said The Mandalorian will return in October and will run beyond season two, "including the possibility of infusing it with more characters and taking those characters in their own direction in terms of series." The CEO also revealed premiere windows for two of the streaming platform's anticipated Marvel Studios shows, WandaVision, and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. More.

+Disney analysts raise stock price targets on Disney+ momentum. "We believed Disney+ subs less than 25 million would drive stock down, greater than 30 million would drive stock up," Bernstein analyst Todd Juenger wrote in a report. "26.5 million is squarely in the 'fairly priced' comfort zone. The 28.6 million update as of yesterday was probably more important: while the sub adds pace has significantly slowed, churn has not driven a decline (yet)." More.

►Spotify is buying Bill Simmons' The Ringer: Terms of the deal for the four-year-old The Ringer were not disclosed, though Natalie Jarvey reports that negotiations continued over Super Bowl weekend, and came down to the wire ahead of the company's earnings this morning. Spotify said it expects the deal, designed to boost the firm's sports vertical in its podcasting business, to close in the first quarter. The story.

+Music streaming giant Spotify on Wednesday said it swung to a fourth-quarter operating loss as it grew its user base to 124 million premium, or paid, subscribers and 271 million total active monthly users as of the end of 2019. "This was the highest net add quarter we’ve ever experienced," the company said. More.

+In other biz news: WarnerMedia faces Wall Street "pressure" ahead of HBO Max launch. As AT&T plans "heavy" investment for its new streaming effort, revenue forecasts dim as its pay TV businesses "bleed market share." The story.



^Studios begin stockpiling for a writers strike: "We learned the hard way last time." As the Writers Guild signals it is "ready for a battle" over streaming revenue, producers are giving early series renewals and extending episode counts in case Hollywood shuts down this summer, Bryn Elise Sandberg reports.

Quote: "'Buyers are stocking up a little more than they normally would at this time of year,' confirms ITV America president Adam Sher, who funnels a robust slate of alternative series across platforms. In fact, sources in the unscripted space suggest that many 'passes' now come with a caveat: If there is a strike and the project hasn't sold elsewhere, sellers will reconsider — or, as one put it, 'they're calling dibs.'" The story.

+Directors Guild to begin formal talks with studios. The Directors Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers will begin formal negotiations February 10, the two organizations said Tuesday. That will come as a relief to the industry, even though the February start is about two months later than talks commenced in recent triennial bargaining cycles. The story.

 The Oscars...

►Why a diverse Academy is just the start for a more inclusive Oscars. While shifting who votes is essential, the way marketers, programmers and tastemakers treat those films sets the course to shaking up the Academy Awards, Rebecca Sun writes.

Quote: "It bothers me when people attack the Academy, when really we should be looking at the system at large — access, financing, people of color being in the room deciding whose stories are worthy to be told," says publicist Ivette Rodriguez, who co-chairs A2020's marketing/PR branch. "Until the agencies, managers, studios and initiatives all tackle this problem together, we'll never see change." The story.

+39 percent of new Oscar voters hail from outside the U.S. Rebecca Keegan explores the story behind the Academy's international push, which helped drive historic nominations for Parasite. The story.

►Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: The sad, “disturbing familiarity" of this year’s Oscar nominees. Nearly as disappointing as the tired lack of inclusivity among this year's best picture contenders, writes the THR columnist, is "the timidity of the filmmakers" that did make the cut.

Quote: "All the nominated movies are good, all are worth paying to see. But almost half do little to elevate art or illuminate the human condition. With so many excellent television shows streaming daily, the 'best' movies must step up their game, not just in technical wonderment but also in literary aspiration." The column.



^Brutally honest Oscar ballot: As voting ends, a female member of the Academy's actors branch, granted anonymity to speak freely, shares which films earn her precious vote (and — gulp — why).

Quote: "I can't vote for Marty [Scorsese, of The Irishman] — nobody wants to say it, but it's just not that good. Todd Phillips did an incredible job on Joker, as did Bong Joon Ho on Parasite, but not the best. I liked 1917 and Sam Mendes' direction, but I thought Quentin did a great job, and I want an American director to win. The Oscars is an American thing; English things win BAFTAs and the French vote for the French, and Quentin Tarantino should be honored for a great American movie." The full ballot.

Three big stars are returning to TV...

+Chris Pratt is reteaming with his Magnificent Seven director Antoine Fuqua to develop The Terminal List. Pratt would both star in and exec produce the conspiracy thriller, which is currently in development. Fuqua will direct the pilot and exec produce. A network is not yet attached.

+Five years after "McDreamy" was shockingly killed off of ABC's Grey's Anatomy, leading man Patrick Dempsey is returning to broadcast. The actor has signed on to star in and exec produce Ways & Means, a newly ordered drama pilot set up at CBS with Nina Tassler, the network's former entertainment president, attached.

+Tom Hiddleston, The Night Manager alum and star of Disney+'s forthcoming Marvel spinoff series Loki is set to topline the Netflix political thriller White Stork, a 10-episode drama from the producers behind the streamer's breakout Sex Education.

Elsewhere in TV...

--Ray Donovan, Showtime's fixer drama starring Liev Schreiber, has been canceled after seven seasons.

--Robyn Bahr reviews Fox's Lego Masters... Daniel Fienberg reviews Apple TV+'s Mythic Quest: Raven's Banquet.

--Ratings: Fox's heavy promotion of 911: Lone Star during the Super Bowl paid off with improved ratings Monday. The Bachelor slipped a little with an extended episode on ABC, though it still led the adults 18-49 rankings in primetime.

--"No one else is a bigger idiot": Curb Your Enthusiasm boss on its willingness to offend.

--ViacomCBS' Smithsonian Channel is launching a Black History Month initiative, tied to its new documentary Black In Space:  Breaking the Color Barrier. The channel is holding special screenings of the doc in 19 cities with the astronauts featured, Smithsonian executives, and filmmaker Laurens Grant.

►Women, actors of color better represented in 2019 films, study finds. In 2019, 31 of the top 100 films featured an underrepresented lead or co-lead, which is up from the 27 films in 2018 and 13 films in 2007, the USC Annenberg study found. Meanwhile, 16 of those films had an underrepresented female as the lead or co-lead. The number is a drastic improvement from the 11 movies in 2018 and one film in 2007 led by underrepresented females. More.

+Elsewhere: Flawed and simplistic metrics may be misleading Hollywood's power brokers about the factors that determine box office success and perpetuating gender and race biases, a new study suggests. More.

 How Joaquin Phoenix vegan-ized awards season behind the scenes. Amid Oscar campaigning and protesting for animal rights, the Joker frontrunner has been driving a covert movement that's transformed five events to meat-free menus, Gary Baum reports: "He knows he's in a good position to push." The story.

+Also: Rihanna will receive the President’s Award during the 51st NAACP Image Awards this month... Award-winning actor and musician Ben Platt was named 2020 Man of the Year by Harvard University's famed Hasty Pudding theater troupe Monday...

Elsewhere in film...

--Netflix has flexed its muscle to pick up Endurance, a sci-fi spec written by Dalton Leeb and Nicholas Jacobson-Larson. Simon Kinberg, making his first feature deal since exiting his overall deal at Fox, is producing via his Genre Films production banner.

--Lionsgate has greenlit a movie about NFL legend Kurt Warner from Kingdom Story Company, producers of the box office hit I Can Only Imagine.

--Robert Redford has come on board to executive produce the feature documentary Public Trust with Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard and his Patagonia Films.

--Amazon Studios has picked up Sundance love story Sylvie's Love, starring Tessa Thompson and Nnamdi Asomugha

--In a move certain to receive widespread support from a cost-conscious indie film industry, the American Film Market is getting shorter.

--Did Contagion predict coronavirus? "It's uncanny," says writer.

 Trump's SOTU Spectacle

►Critic's notebook: Trump's nine lives on full display in State of the Union address. The president sticks to the script for his speech the night before the Senate's impeachment vote, and you could tell it was killing him, Frank Scheck writes.

Quote: "As usual, Trump made every effort to turn his annual report to the nation into an entertaining episode of his personally hosted reality show... To illustrate his support of school choice, Trump introduced an adorable fourth-grader who's on a long waiting list for an opportunity scholarship in her home city of Philadelphia."

"Trump then grandiosely announced that such a scholarship had just been awarded to her and that she could now attend the school of her choice. Watching the joy on her and her mother's face made for a lovely moment, but you began to think that Trump would follow it up by shouting "You get a car! You get a car!" He's the only president whose State of the Union addresses come with door prizes." The notebook.

+Conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh has been awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor. President Donald Trump announced the award during his State of the Union address Tuesday night. First lady Melania Trump presented the award to Limbaugh. The two sat next to each other in the House visitors' gallery. A bearded Limbaugh stood and saluted President Trump as the award was announced. More.

+The late night take: "We felt what you just felt. We drank what you drank," Stephen Colbert said at the top of his monologue. "Only now we're drunk at work," the host added, sipping on some alcohol before launching into hot takes on Trump's speech in a special edition titled "Don and the Giant Imspeech." More.

 Frank Darabont is asking a New York judge to reject AMC's efforts to relitigate issues that have already been decided in their dispute over his profits from The Walking Dead. More.

►When my dad won best picture: Driving Miss Daisy director and daughter reflect on the (still controversial) movie, 30 years later. Australian filmmaker Bruce Beresford’s kid, then a rambunctious toddler and now a THR staffer, interviews her father about the making of his chauffeur drama, which triumphed three decades ago at the Oscars. The interview.

Obituary: Gene Reynolds, the prolific director, producer and writer who was a driving force behind such socially conscious television series as M*A*S*H, Lou Grant and Room 222, has died. He was 96. Reynolds died Monday at Providence Saint Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, the DGA announced. The obituary.

Revolving door: Fox Alternative Entertainment, the broadcast network’s new independent unscripted studio, has tapped reality veteran Allison Wallach as its new executive vp... Gonring, Spahn & Associates — is adding a third name to its signage. The firm named public affairs and political strategist Jennifer Lin as managing partner and has renamed itself Gonring|Lin|Spahn... Dan Houser, one of the four co-founders of Rockstar Games, is departing the game studio...  You're the Worst mastermind Stephen Falk has been tapped to serve as the creator, writer and showrunner on the as-yet untitled WeWork TV series... WME has signed vlogger Anastasia Radzinskaia... CAA has signed The Witcher star Freya Allan...

Casting roundup: John Travolta is set to star opposite Kevin Hart in the action-comedy Die Hart (formerly Action Scene) at Quibi... -Swedish filmmaker Ruben Ostlund, winner of the 2017 Cannes Palme d'Or for The Square, has cast Woody Harrelson and newcomers Charlbi Dean and Harris Dickinson in his satire Triangle of Sadness.

What else we're reading...

--"Netflix spends big for Oscars. Will Hollywood give in?" [WSJ]

--"NBC affiliates in talks on Peacock latenight" [TVNewsCheck]

--"YouTube will fund kids shows based on these 12 words" [Bloomberg]

"How the sausage is rated" [VentureBeat]

Today's birthdays: Cristiano Ronaldo, 35, Charlotte Rampling, 74, Jennifer Jason Leigh, 58, Tim Meadows, 59, Hank Aaron, 86.