Warner Bros. Discovery Sets Asia Pacific Leadership Roles

Warner Bros. Discovery has said British laws that restrict the period distributors can require exhibitors to screen their films may now be “outdated,” and it is time for the UK government to consider repealing the legislation. 

Media, entertainment and tech companies held their own in the top 25 ranking of overpaid CEOs in 2022 by nonprofit As You Sow. Live Nation’s Michael Rapino ($139 million pay package) topped the list, which also included Netflix, Paramount Global and Warner Bros Discovery, as well as Charter, Apple and Alphabet.

Jaden Thompson Congressman Joaquin Castro has taken to X/Twitter to call out Warner Bros. Discovery for planning to shelve the completed film “Coyote vs. Acme” for the sake of receiving a $30 million tax break.

Texas congressman Joaquin Castro has taken to X to slam Warner Bros Discovery for axing the $70M Coyote vs. Acme for a reported $30M tax writeoff. That said, as we first reported, the studio is changing course this week and screening the film for potential buyers, i.e. Amazon Prime (a leading contender), Apple and Netflix. This pivot by studio brass was made after a weekend in which the studio’s phone rang off the hook by the creative community over the cancelling of the finished film, as well as an outcry by the pic’s composer Steven Price among others online.

Rebecca Rubin Film and Media Reporter “Coyote vs. Acme” is officially on the market. Days after Warner Bros.

EXCLUSIVE: Screenings are being set up this week for streamers Amazon Prime, Apple and Netflix to check out and potentially acquire Warner Bros‘ axed Looney Tunes movie Coyote Vs. Acme after the studio’s phone ran off the hook the entire weekend from angry filmmakers and talent reps over their third feature film kill after Batgirl and Scoob Holiday Haunt! The more egregious Hollywood sin here with Coyote vs. Acme is that it’s a finished film, that was intended for a theatrical release, while the other two movies were still in the works.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor Warner Bros. will be juggling a lot in the Oscar race for best original song. As confirmed by an FYC advertisement sent to Critics Choice Association members, along with the multiple tracks from “Barbie” by Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa, Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt, the studio will also handle several numbers from their two upcoming holiday movie musicals: “The Color Purple” and “Wonka.” The upcoming adaptation of the musical “The Color Purple” will screen in front of its first official audience of industry voters and journalists next week.

Warner Bros Discovery is reteaming with Taiwanese production company DaMou Entertainment to produce HBO Asia original Fired Up! (working title), an adaptation of hit Kakao webtoon Itaewon Class. 

Investors bid down shares of Warner Bros. Discovery today as its chief financial officer described a U.S. ad market “that has continued to be weaker than we had hoped” and a recovery that’s hard to predict “with any conviction.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav opened the company’s quarterly earnings presentation with remarks on the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike, remaining “hopeful” that the work stoppage will end “soon” following the Hollywood studios’ move to adjust AI language in its “last, best and final offer” to the actors union. “We are hopeful we will reach a resolution to the SAG-AFTRA strike soon,” Zaslav said during WBD’s third-quarter earnings call Wednesday.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Warner Bros. Discovery narrowed its third-quarter loss as the media giant, grappling with billions of dollars in debt as a result of the 2022 merger that created it, saw the box-office success of “Barbie” offset by a 12% decline in advertising at its portfolio of TV networks. The owner of CNN, the Warner Bros.

Warner Bros. Discovery’s third quarter was mixed with ‘Barbie’ coin and free cash flow beloved by Wall Street offset by sluggish advertising and the impact of the actors’ strike on the one of the industry’s biggest content creators.

Free TV Networks, a new programming entity with a presence in both over-the-air broadcast and streaming, has enlisted Warner Bros. Discovery, Lionsgate and Gray Television as partners and suppliers.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Unscripted queer reality dating series “Boys Like Boys” is to air on Warner Bros. Discovery’s TLC channel in Taiwan in early 2024, making it the first local LGBTQ+ dating reality show to air on linear TV in the territory. The show is an original production by GagaOOLala, Asia’s out and proud LGBTQ+ streaming service, which is pitching an expanded array of queer content at the Taiwan Creative Contents Fest (TCCF) that launches Tuesday in Taipei. “Boys Like Boys” had its premiere at the Kaohsiung International Film Festival and is now available worldwide on GagaOOLala and WeTV in the Philippines and Thailand, where the ‘Boys Love’ genre has become highly popular.

As Kelsey Grammer says in his 2020 low-budget action movie Money Plane, “Whatever you want to wager on, the money plane has you covered. You want to bet on a dude f*cking an alligator? Money Plane.”

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Warner Bros. Discovery, Taiwan Mobile and the Taiwan Creative Content Agency have signed a multi-year memorandum of understanding to create and distribute Taiwanese original content locally and across international markets. The MOU, signed in advance of next week’s TCCF event, combines the expertise and reach of the three companies to develop, produce and distribute local IP and content for both local and global audiences.

Japan has dominated this year’s Asia Pacific Screen Awards (APSA), with German filmmaker Wim Wenders’ latest Tokyo-set pic and Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Drive My Car follow-up taking the top prizes. 

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Two films from Japan, Wim Wenders’ “Perfect Days” and Hamaguchi Ryusuke’s “Evil Does Not Exist,” won the top prizes at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards on Friday. Multiple other honors went to films from Korea and Kazakhstan. The 16th edition of the APSA Awards was held on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia and recognized films from eight countries. “Perfect Days,” a gentle comedy drama about a toilet cleaner in Tokyo finding happiness in the everyday, premiered in Cannes and more recently was selected as Japan’s Oscar contender and as the opening title of the Tokyo International Film Festival.

EXCLUSIVE: Warner Bros and producer Amy Pascal have emerged victorious in a spirited book-rights auction for How to Rule the World: Yacht Parties, Culture Wars and the Downfall of a President at Stanford. Written by Theo Baker, book tells his story of being an 18-year-old freshman at Stanford who wrote a series of reports for the university’s newspaper skeptical of the questionable research practices of the school’s president Marc Tessier-Lavigne, a neuroscientist who was on the short list for the Nobel Prize.

Warner Bros Discovery‘s international restructuring has continued with James Gibbons setting out the shape of his Asia Pacific team, with Japanese Country Manager Masami Takahashi choosing to retire.