Sony Returns To Exhibition Business, Acquires Alamo Drafthouse Cinema Circuit

Sony Pictures Television (SPT) is maintaining its focus on British TV drama with another big acquisition deal.

Naman Ramachandran Sony Pictures Television (SPT) has revealed an increased investment in Eleventh Hour Films (EHF), taking a majority stake in the U.K.-based production company. This move makes EHF the fourth majority-owned, U.K.-based scripted drama company in SPT’s International Production group, joining Left Bank Pictures, Bad Wolf and Eleven. The investment follows a period of growth for EHF, which has secured multiple commissions and recommissions.

Rebecca Rubin Senior Film and Media Reporter Alamo Drafthouse is taking over the six franchisee locations that closed in June due to bankruptcy. The venues, including five Texas locations in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, as well as a Minnesota venue in Woodbury, are set to reopen this summer.

EXCLUSIVE: We’re getting word about a series in the works from Sony Pictures Television‘s AFFIRM television and Revelations Entertainment which is centering around the Biblical Nazarene movement.

It’s official: Sony Pictures will have “Street Fighter” be back in theaters in a couple of years, but without the Philippou brothers at the helm. THR reports that the studio plans to have a new movie based on the Capcom video game franchise ready for a March 20, 2026 theatrical release.  Legendary co-develops the film, with Capcom on board as producer.

AI) companies for copyright infringement.The news of the lawsuit was shared on Monday (June 24) by the Recording Industry Association of America, and accused companies Suno and Udio of committing copyright violations of “an almost unimaginable scale”.It is the latest of many lawsuits that have been filed in recent months, in a bid to challenge the rights of AI companies to use and reimagine their work.Udio is a firm based in New York, which has garnered popularity in recent months for allowing users to use AI in a musical setting. Already it has received backing from high-profile investors including Andreessen Horowitz and gained attention as being the technology responsible for creating ‘BBL Drizzy’ – a parody diss track that emerged among the Kendrick Lamar/Drake feud.Suno is a company based in Massachusetts, which emerged in 2023 and claims that over 10million people have already used it to create AI-assisted music.

several cases brought by authors, news outlets and others over the alleged misuse of their work to train text-based AI models powering chatbots like OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

Sony Pictures Networks India has named Disney+ Hotstar content chief Gaurav Banerjee as its new Managing Director and CEO.

Sony Pictures Networks India (SPNI) has confirmed Gaurav Banerjee as its new managing director and CEO. He will take the reins on or before Aug. 26, pending approvals.

Jem Aswad Executive Editor, Music The Queen music catalog, along with a number of other rights, is in the process of being acquired by Sony Music for £1 billion (around $1.27 billion), two sources confirm to Variety. The news was first reported by Hits; according to their report, the only revenue not covered in the deal is for live performances, which founding members Brian May and Roger Taylor, who still actively tour with singer Adam Lambert, will retain.

EXCLUSIVE: Sony Pictures Classics has acquired worldwide rights to Blue Moon, the new film from Academy Award nominee Richard Linklater (Hit Man), on which we were first to report, and which will be his next effort after all, with production commencing in Dublin, Ireland this summer.

Sony sat out CinemaCon in April this year, but was the first major studio to present at CineEurope in Barcelona today, culminating in a screening of Apple Original Films’ Scarlett Johansson/Channing Tatum-starrer Fly Me to the Moon which Sony is releasing theatrically.

EXCLUSIVE: Ronald D. Moore is back at Sony Pictures Television, signing a multi-year overall deal with the independent studio. Under the pact, Moore, his Tall Ship Productions banner, and longtime collaborators Maril Davis and Ben McGinnis will develop and produce scripted series for cable and streaming platforms.

Simone Ashley opened up about the future of Anthony Bridgerton and Kate Sharma on Bridgerton.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Sony Pictures Classics‘ Dylan Leiner along with FilmNation’s Stefan Zorich and Paramount‘s Fabrizio Carrer were among the top film executives and companies who participated in the 13th NY Film & Entertainment Soccer Tournament for charity hosted at the Tribeca Festival. The sun-drenched event gathered 39 teams, along with more than 60 filmmakers from the Tribeca Festival, and hundreds of spectators at Brooklyn Bridge Park overlooking downtown Manhattan.

Brent Lang Executive Editor It’s been a tough time for the movie business. The 2023 actors and writers strikes brought production to a standstill, leaving studios with fewer films to release in theaters. That’s bad news for cinemas, which are struggling to dig out from the financial hole left by COVID shutdowns and laboring to get audiences to visit the multiplexes at the numbers they were before the pandemic.

Brent Lang Executive Editor Sony Pictures Entertainment has acquired Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, the theater chain that inspired a passionate following with its creative cocktails, extensive food menu and strict “no talking, no texting” policies. The media company acquired Alamo Drafthouse from owners Altamont Capital Partners, Fortress Investment Group and its founder Tim League. Under its new ownership, Alamo Drafthouse will be managed under a newly established division, Sony Pictures Experiences.

Lada Guruden Singh Steps Down From Sony Pictures India Role

EXCLUSIVE: Netflix and Sony are teaming to develop a series based on the 2021 film Fatherhood, in which Kevin Hart played a single dad who raises his daughter after losing his wife a day after the baby was born. After directing the film, Paul Weitz will write the series and direct it. This will be a co-production team-up between Kevin Hart’s Hartbreat and Barack and Michelle Obama’s Higher Ground.

EXCLUSIVE: TV writers-producers Denise Thé, Melissa Scrivner Love, and Amanda Segel have formally launched Third Rail Productions with a first-look deal at Sony Pictures Television. Under the two-year pact, the trio will develop and produce scripted series for cable and streaming, focusing on dramas with female leads.