Today In Entertainment

SEPTEMBER 11, 2020

What's news: The backstory behind Netflix's shocking executive shakeup, Mulan starts off slow in China, what the ends of The Walking Dead and Keeping Up With the Kardashians have in common, Venice's post-lockdown experiment seen as a success, Disney+ orders its Doogie remake, SNL plots studio return. Plus: Range Media expands into music, and Tyler "Ninja" Blevins returns to Twitch. --Alex Weprin

 Inside Netflix's Shocking Shak-eup

➤Inside Netflix's surprising TV chief shake-up. The ouster of longtime exec Cindy Holland to promote Bela Bajaria arrives as co-CEO Ted Sarandos aims to increase its focus on global expansion, Lesley Goldberg, Kim Masters and Natalie Jarvey report.

--Bajaria, whose rapid rise to the top was also fueled and likely accelerated by an offer from NBCUniversal to oversee the conglomerate's entertainment portfolio, now has oversight of English and local language original series, scripted and unscripted series and limited series.

--"Cindy had no global experience," says another former Netflix exec with knowledge of the streamer's programming performance. "The real power of Netflix is not the stuff we talk about [think Stranger Things]; it's The Witcher, Money Heist, Dark and all the international stuff — not making more Ozark. And [Bela] made smart acquisitions and spear-headed unscripted, too." The story.

➤Box office: Mulan gets off to a slow start in China. Mulan had pulled in just $4.4 million (30 million RMB) as of 5 p.m., Beijing time, Friday, according to data from local box office tracker Artisan Gateway. As of 8 p.m., local time, ticket sales had climbed to approximately $6 million (41 million RMB). Beijing authorities told major media outlets in the country not to cover Mulan in any way, according to a report Friday from Reuters. The blackout on Mulan coverage appears to be a reaction to recent international outcry over a pair of human rights scandals associated with the movie. The story.

 What 'The Waking Dead' and 'Keeping Up With the Kardashians' Have In Common

➤Inside the end of two mega-hits: The Walking Dead and Keeping Up With the Kardashians. The AMC zombie drama and E! docuseries both launched multibillion-dollar brands and their respective endgames have more in common than you'd expect, Lesley Goldberg writes. The story.

➤The teenage doctor is (back) in at Disney+. The streaming service has given a series order to Doogie Kameāloha, M.D., a reboot of ABC's 1989-93 series Doogie Howser, M.D. that starred Neil Patrick Harris. The new series will have a mixed-race teenage girl from Hawaii at its center. The update comes from Fresh Off the Boat and How I Met Your Mother veteran Kourtney Kang and 20th Television, which produced the original. The story.

+Saturday Night Live is getting back into the studio to start its 46th season on NBC. The sketch comedy series has set Oct. 3 for its season premiere, once again airing live across the country at 11:30 p.m. ET. NBC says the show will return to its home base in Rockefeller Center's Studio 8H to kick off the season. The premiere will mark the first in-studio edition of SNL in nearly seven months. The show's last episode before the coronavirus pandemic shut down production aired on March 7, with Daniel Craig hosting. The story.

In other TV news...

+Jessica Chastain is heading to television. The Zero Dark Thirty and Molly's Game actress will play country music legend Tammy Wynette in a limited series called George & Tammy for Spectrum Originals and Paramount Network. The drama, which was originally developed as a Fox Searchlight feature film a few years ago, chronicles the country music power couple, Wynette and George Jones, whose complicated relationship inspired some of the most iconic music of all time. The story.

+Starz is adding to its roster of original series with the pickup of a half-hour dramedy based on the 2018 movie Blindspotting. The movie's writers, stars and producers, Daveed Diggs and Rafael Casal, will also write and executive produce the series from Lionsgate TV. Casal will serve as showrunner and also have a recurring on-screen role. Jasmine Cephas Jones stars, reprising her role from the indie film, and serves as producer. More.

+A TV project starring Nicolas Cage as Tiger King subject Joe Exotic has found a home at Amazon. The tech giant's Prime Video streaming platform will develop the scripted series from CBS Television Studios and Imagine Entertainment. Amazon Studios has also come aboard to produce. The story.

+Eva Longoria is staying put at 20th Television. The actress, producer and director has re-upped a three-year, first-look deal with the Disney Television Studios unit. Her UnbeliEVAble Entertainment has several projects in the works with the studio. More.

+Steven Canals is spreading his wings to broadcast. The Pose creator has set up drama In the End at ABC. The project, which has received a script commitment, revolves around Kiona Brown, who, incapable of living life to the fullest, makes the only logical choice — to embrace death as an end-of-life doula. With an eclectic list of patients - including cancer survivor Mariana Cortez - Kiona soon discovers the secret to a new beginning is to embrace what happens…in the end. More.

+CBS Television Studios has signed an overall deal with Diary of a Future President creator Ilana Peña. Under the deal, Peña (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend) will continue to work on the Disney+ series, which has been renewed for a second season, and develop new projects. More.

+Also: Anthony Anderson, America Ferrera, Issa Rae, Gabrielle Union, J.J. Watt, Lena Waithe and Oprah Winfrey were announced Thursday as stars set to make appearances during the Emmys.... ABC will get its Wednesday comedy block back on the air in late October as the network continues to fill out its fall schedule... The Comey Rule creator talks "enormous responsibility" of Showtime series: "We wanted to tell the truth"...

 How Venice Made It Work

➤Venice's post-lockdown festival is being viewed as a success. Yes, there were fewer stars and fewer (read no) tentpole titles. But films were shown, paparazzi flashbulbs popped, and press junkets got done. There were even some distribution deals signed along the way, Scott Roxborough reports. The story.

Meanwhile, in Toronto...

➤Ammonite director talks landing Kate Winslet, onscreen nudity and why he's not thinking about awards season. One of the most eagerly anticipated titles at TIFF, Francis Lee's period lesbian drama tells the story of a fossil hunter whose groundbreaking work was coopted by less deserving men. The interview.

+Review: David Byrne's American Utopia. David Rooney reviews Spike Lee's take on the Broadway show, writing that "Lee's knack for distilling the energy of live performance is no secret, for example in his terrific 2009 film of the unconventional Broadway musical Passing Strange. But the synergy here between filmmaker and subject — from the avant-funk grooves to the spirit of inclusivity and the urge to heal a broken nation — is simply spectacular." The review.

+Also: TIFF on Thursday grappled with the issue of Hollywood co-opting minority cultures for story content as Indigenous filmmakers challenged White directors not to take on the voices of underrepresented communities as their own... German major Leonine has snatched up the rights for Germany to Guy Ritchie's Miramax spy thriller Five Eyes, starring Jason Statham, during the Toronto Film Festival's virtual market...

➤Academy Museum reveals plans for inaugural Hayao Miyazaki retrospective. Organized in collaboration with Japan's fabled Studio Ghibli, which Miyazaki co-founded in 1985, the first North American retrospective of the Japanese animation master's work will be on view when the museum opens to the public on April 30, 2021. The story.

In other film news...

+Elizabeth Raposo is exiting her role as president of production of Paramount's motion picture group. She had served in the top role for three years. Her departure was revealed in a note to staff authored by Emma Watts, the studio's newly installed motion picture group president under Paramount CEO Jim Gianopulos. The story.

+Brooke Shields and Cary Elwes are spending the holidays with Netflix. The duo will star in A Castle for Christmas, a new romantic comedy from the streamer. The story follows a famed American author, Sophie, who travels to Scotland and finds herself wanting to buy a castle, but the prickly owner, a Scottish Duke named Myles, is reluctant to sell to a foreigner. Working to find a compromise, the pair constantly butt heads, but along the way they just may find more than they bargained for. The story.

+Neve Campbell is officially back for the Scream reboot. After months of courting and negotiations, Campbell has signed on to reprise her role as Sidney Prescott in the new horror thriller from Spyglass Media and Paramount that is intended to relaunch the franchise. More.

+Neon has picked up Alex Gibney’s latest documentary, Totally Under Control, about U.S. president Donald Trump's failed response to the global Coronavirus pandemic, for an October theatrical release. "With an extraordinary team of collaborators, I was compelled to mount this production when I saw the scale of incompetence and political corruption by the Trump Administration in the face of a global pandemic," Gibney said in a statement on Thursday. More.

In business news...

➤Fox Corp. CEO Lachlan Murdoch says his slimmed-down media firm has fared well during the pandemic because of the assets it retained as part of its $71.3 billion sale of 21st Century Fox assets to Walt Disney. He pointed to the Fox News Channel, which is enjoying a thriving advertising market as the U.S. presidential election heads towards a November 3 vote. "You'll see this Sunday, the Biden campaign spending quite substantially," Murdoch reported. The story.

+Megyn Kelly is launching her own independent production company, Devil May Care Media, with podcasts as key content in its pipeline. Front and center will be Kelly's own podcast, The Megyn Kelly Show, to feature interviews with newsmakers and other guests. Kelly's indie banner will also produce content, including audio fare, based on breaking news, current events and legal and cultural issues. The story.

+Speaking of podcasts: iHeartMedia chairman and CEO Bob Pittman told an investor conference on Thursday that podcast advertising trends have remained strong during the coronavirus pandemic and described podcasting as a Netflix for radio. More.

+Range Media, the newly launched management and brand development firm, has launched a music division, tapping Matt Graham of music representation firm BRND MGMT to lead it.

--Graham, who becomes a co-founding partner and takes on the position of head of music, will be joined by BRND partner and general manager, Jack Minihan, who will serve as Range’s exec vp of music. Also boarding Range are BRND’s existing team of managers; Jordan Dettmer, Stephanie Marks, and Alicia Mathews; and associate Isaac Zepeda. The story.

➤Big news from the gaming world: A little more than a year after gamer Tyler "Ninja" Blevins left Twitch for rival platform Mixer, the streamer is returning to his former home. Blevins has inked an exclusive multiyear deal with Twitch, the Amazon-owned game streaming platform where he built a large following and became a globally recognized professional gamer. The story.

➤An update in the AMC v. Frank Darabont fracas. As AMC and The Walking Dead co-creator Frank Darabont approach trial in their dispute over his profits from the hit series, they're battling over what evidence can be presented to the jury — including whether or not the network can show the jurors Darabont's emails to colleagues. The long-gestating fight between the network on one side and Darabont and mega-agency CAA on the other is currently set for trial in 2021. More.

+In other legal news: The Department of Justice argues a TikTok employee's fear that the executive order banning transactions with Beijing-based parent ByteDance will keep him from getting paid isn't enough to warrant a temporary restraining order that would keep the Department of Commerce from enforcing it. More.

➤TV's Top 5 podcast: During this episode, hosts Daniel Fienberg and Lesley Goldberg break down a busy week of news and welcome Kathleen Jordan, the creator and showrunner of Netflix's Teenage Bounty Hunters to the show. Listen.

➤Film review: John DeFore reviews The Devil All The Time, writing that "though its structure doesn't always work to maximum effect, the grim picture gets more involving as it goes and benefits from a hell of a cast." The review.

➤TV review: Daniel Fienberg reviews HBO's Coastal Elites, writing that the pandemic anthology is "too often infuriatingly loud, overplays too many dramatic beats and takes what should have been a series of intimate monologues and makes them cartoonish." The review.

In other news...

--Music and media mogul Haim Saban is formally entering the 2020 election fray, throwing his support behind Democratic nominee Joe Biden, urging the party to unite behind him, and hosting a $500,000 per person virtual fundraiser for the candidate next week.

--Blumhouse has inked a three-picture pact with Rob Savage, the director behind the critically acclaimed lockdown-produced horror film Host.

--Pierce Brosnan, Lilly Singh and Brendan Gleeson will lend their voices to the animated feature Riverdance: The Animated Adventure.

--Gordon Ramsay will host new BBC game show Bank Balance, the U.K. public broadcaster said Friday.

--Warner Bros. has decided to release Tenet at drive-in theaters in the L.A. area.

--Sean Penn and Ann Lee’s nonprofit Community Organized Relief Effort (CORE) pivoted early in the COVID-19 pandemic to help assist Los Angeles with the city’s testing efforts. Now, the organization is pivoting once again to offer private, for-profit COVID-19 testing services to film and TV productions.

--Quiver Distribution and Redbox Entertainment have teamed to acquire the North American rights to the action comedy Chick Fight, starring Malin Akerman and Alec Baldwin.

--Six months after Hollywood's last major premiere — Mulan's Hollywood Boulevard takeover on March 9 — red carpets have officially made a comeback, with HBO Max's Unpregnant debuting a drive-thru red carpet at its drive-in premiere on Wednesday.

What else we're reading...

--"WarnerMedia eyes spring debut for HBO Max’s ad-supported tier" [Digiday]

--"Tucker Carlson, who has advised Trump, slams CNN's Zucker for advising Trump associate" [Washington Post]

--"Pulitzers to consider canceled plays and streamed productions for 2021 prize" [NY Times]

--"At this Burbank deli, they came for the pastrami but stayed for the cartoons" [LA Times]

Today's birthdays: Brian De Palma, 80, Taraji P. Henson, 50, Harry Connick Jr., 53, Ludacris, 43, Moby, 55.

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SEPTEMBER 11, 2020

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