To say that 2020 requires a certain fortitude of the spirit, an ability to roll with the punches, is perhaps an understatement. Amid the backdrop of the pandemic and the ongoing, years-long digestion of several mega-mergers, from Disney-Fox to ViacomCBS to AT&T’s WarnerMedia, pretty much every legacy entertainment house in town is in the process
Elliot Grainge, founder and CEO of the independent record label 10K Projects, has promoted Theo Battaglia to the newly created position of executive vice president/head of creative at the company. In this new role, Battaglia will oversee all creative services at the company, and will continue in his role leading the artist marketing team, including
Did Van Morrison and Eric Clapton not get the memo that there is a global health catastrophe that has so far claimed nearly 1.5 million lives worldwide? Do they not know that this pandemic is far from over? In what world are these two living? The fact that they would decide to collaborate on a
Zoë Friend is leaving Netflix after more than five years to join entertainment research firm MarketCast as corporate senior VP of custom research and insights. In the new role, Friend will lead MarketCast’s custom research practice across all of its business segments for media, sports and brand clients. Most recently, Friend was Netflix’s VP of
Discovery expects its forthcoming Discovery Plus streaming service to have an addressable market in the U.S. of at least 70 million homes — and at least 400 million households globally. That’s based on the assumption that there are 300 million broadband-only homes in the United States and about 80 million pay-TV homes, Discovery CFO Gunnar
John Mulaney said comments he made on “Saturday Night Live” in February resulted in the Secret Service opening an investigation into him. During an interview on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” on Tuesday, the comedian — who got his start as a writer on “SNL” — mentioned that he received backlash for a joke that was, at
Julianna Margulies has joined the cast of “The Morning Show” Season 2, Variety has learned exclusively. She will play Laura Peterson, an anchor at UBA News. She joins returning series stars Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon as well as Steve Carell, Billy Crudup, Mark Duplass, Nestor Carbonell, Bel Powley, Karen Puttman, and Desean Terry. It was
“The Masked Singer” has been renewed for Season 5 on Fox, the broadcaster announced Wednesday. Season 5 will air on Fox in 2021. The news comes ahead of the two-hour Season 4 semi-finals episode that will tonight on Fox beginning at 8 p.m. ET/PT. “I’m so happy to announce a new season of ‘The Masked
“Euphoria” fans are getting a very early Christmas present. The first of two special episodes of the HBO hit drama is set to drop several days early on HBO Max. Viewers will be able to stream the episode from Thursday, Dec. 3 at 9 p.m. PT on the service, a full three days ahead of
Under normal circumstances, 2020 should have been a nonstop victory lap for Roddy Ricch, who has enjoyed as good a past 12 months as any 22-year-old rapper could imagine. He won his first Grammy in January, for his appearance on Nipsey Hussle’s “Racks in the Middle,” and he just racked up six nominations for next
Jaden Smith isn’t just an actor and a musician. The 22-year-old son of Will and Jada Pinkett Smith is also a social activist — more specifically a water activist. His nonprofit 501CTHREE.org has teamed up with KindHuman and Homeless Health Care to install a water box in Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles to provide
QCode, a scripted podcast media startup, hired former Apple Podcasts marketing executive Steve Wilson as chief strategy officer. At QCode, Wilson will oversee partnerships, marketing, distribution and collaborate on content strategy. He joins the company after nearly 15 years at Apple, where most recently he headed marketing for Apple Podcasts and partnered with podcasters and
All products and services featured by Variety are independently selected by Variety editors. However, Variety may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes. If you’ve found yourself glued to Netflix’s hit series “The Crown” as of the late (and you’re definitely
As Disney, Netflix and WarnerMedia try to boost new streaming-video hubs with glitzy movies and TV celebrities, rival Discovery plans a different hook: real life. The company best known for cable networks like Discovery Channel, TLC, Food Network and HGTV centered on unscripted programming, unveiled a new “Discovery Plus” streaming hub Wednesday, offering the service
In her new memoir, “Happiness Becomes You: A Guide to Changing Your Life for Good,” Tina Turner explores spirituality and her Buddhist practice and how they have helped her overcome loss, negativity and domestic abuse. Variety caught up with the 81-year-old music icon, who lives in Switzerland, via email ahead of the the book’s release
Not unlike the proper pronunciation of the word vermeil (vurrr-may) or various shortcuts on Microsoft Excel, London-based retailer Wolf & Badger falls into the category of wonderful things I regret being years late to discover. Founded by brothers George and Henry Graham back in 2010 as a website to connect consumers to independent designers, Wolf
Georgia, through a combination of generous tax breaks and an impressive infrastructure, has spent the past 12 years transforming itself into the Hollywood of the South. The numbers tell the remarkable story of how the state has become a vital outpost for movies and television. The entertainment industry has grown to a $9.5 billion business in Georgia, with 34
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Collectively, our approach to fashion has changed a lot over the past year. Whereas in seasons before we’ve been quick to embrace trend after trend, we now find ourselves drawn to the classics—pieces that offer the comfort and practicality we look for in a time of scaled-back outings, but also exude the quality and timelessness
Margaret Qualley is among the vanishingly few people in Hollywood who can credibly wield the word “gosh.” Jimmy Stewart’s favorite interjection resounds through her sentences like a slingshot, going hand in hand with her soft North Carolina twang and sweet manner. She is one of an even smaller number of actresses who could take the
“Vikings” Season 6 will roll out its final episodes on Amazon prior to airing on its linear home on History Channel. The last 10 episodes of the show’s final season will drop on Amazon in the US, UK, Germany, Austria and Ireland on Dec. 30. They will then roll out on History, which has aired
In today’s Global Bulletin, Aardman and Bandai Namco team to create new trans-media IP, About Premium Content sells “Man in Room 301,” Filmlance International will adapt “Jana Kippo” for TV and BBC Three sets a new esports docuseries for BBC iPlayer. DEVELOPMENT Stop motion pioneers Aardman are teaming with video game developer and publisher Bandai
Helen Hunt has signed on for a role in the upcoming “Blindspotting” series at Starz, Variety has learned. Hunt joins previously announced series lead Jasmine Cephas Jones, who is reprising the role of Ashley from the film on which the series is based. Variety exclusively reported yesterday that Benjamin Earl Turner, Atticus Woodward, Jaylen Barron, and
Industry veteran Josh Deutsch and celebrated music supervisor Randall Poster have joined forces, combining their two respective companies, Premier and Search Party. Premier Music Group, a leading sync agency launched in 2017 by Downtown Music co-founders Deutsch and Terence Lam, announced the acquisition today. Poster founded Search Party in 2004. In consolidating the two companies,
Death Cab for Cutie will release on Friday “The Georgia E.P.” — a five-track E.P. of covers of songs by artists from the state of Georgia, with all net proceeds going to Fair Fight Action, Stacey Abrams’ voter’s rights organization that promotes fair elections around the country through voter education, election reform, and combating voter suppression.
Taylor Swift fans no longer have to leave what her re-recordings of her old catalog might sound like to pure speculation. She has revealed a snippet of one of them in a highly comical new commercial for the dating site Match: a redo of her O.G. hit “Love Story.” Swift posted on Twitter: “Okay so
NBC has “The Voice.” Pepsi hopes to build a similar phenomenon with “Your Wildest Dreams.” The beverage giant will launch a virtual hip-hop talent competition on Triller, the social-networking app that helps users edit and synchronize videos to backing tracks that is owned by producer Ryan Kavanaugh’s Proxima Media. Over six weeks, Triller will conduct
“We’ll dance again,” Harry Styles coos, the Los Angeles sunshine peeking through his pandemic-shaggy hair just so. The singer, songwriter and actor — beloved and critically acclaimed thanks to his life-affirming year-old album, “Fine Line” — is lamenting that his Variety Hitmaker of the Year cover conversation has to be conducted over Zoom rather than
Welcome to the return of “Just for Variety,” the legendary Daily Variety column that began in 1945 and, with Army Archerd at the helm, was a must-read until it ended in 2005. The new “Just for Variety,” written by yours truly, will run in print and online. My mission? To provide inside dish from in
Where do people get their personalities? Do parents play a part, or are such things somehow determined before birth? For centuries, doctors of psychology, doctors of philosophy and doctors of theology have contributed their thoughts on the subject, but the latest breakthrough comes from another kind of doctor entirely: Pete Docter, the big-idea Pixar brain