Warner Bros Pictures Names Michele Imperato Stabile President of Worldwide Physical Production

EXCLUSIVE: Smokehouse Pictures partner George Clooney and Grant Heslov have signed an overall film deal with the Warner Bros. Pictures Group and its Co-Chairs and CEOs Mike De Luca and Pam Abdy. It amounts to a homecoming for the filmmakers, who named their company for the Smoke House steak joint right off the Warner Bros lot, where they used to eat all the time. Clooney’s history with the studio goes back to his breakthrough starring role in the Warner Bros Television drama ER. They made their first deal at Warner Bros when they formed Smokehouse in 2006.

EXCLUSIVE: In one of the wildest book rights auctions the town has seen in some time, Warner Bros. production co-heads Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy tonight landed screen rights to the upcoming T.J. Newman novel Drowning: The Rescue Of Flight 1421. Studio paid $1.5 million against $3 million, and there were five seven-figure bids on the table, sources said.    

Could Hercule Poirot be headed to this year’s Venice Film Festival?

EXCLUSIVE: Howard Swartz, who has overseen hundreds of hours of Shark Week programming, is exiting Warner Bros Discovery to take up a new role at Banijay Americas-owned Stephen David Entertainment.

What’s David Robert Mitchell been up to lately? Well, since “Under The Silver Lake,” not much, but that’s about to change. Deadline reports that Mitchell has his next project lined up at Warner Bros., and the director is teaming up with Anne Hathaway and the Bad Robot crew for a new mystery project.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Warner Bros. Discovery received stock upgrades from two media analyst firms Friday for, among other things, making the decision to tie bonuses for CEO David Zaslav and his team to free cash flow performance. “We threw everything and the kitchen sink at a Downside Case scenario for WBD, and it still delevers to 3x by ’25E,” Wells Fargo analysts wrote in a research note published Friday, in which they upgraded WBD’s stock to “overweight” with a price target increase from $13 to $20 per share. “We now have conviction in FCF to limit downside, while the stock has asymmetric upside.” Meanwhile, Wolfe Research moved WBD from its “peer perform” rating to “outperform” and also upped the price target to $20. (At time of publication Friday, WBD stock was trading at $14.51 per share.)

Joe Otterson TV Reporter The “Willow” TV series is done after just one season at Disney+, Variety has confirmed. The news comes around two months after the high fantasy series aired its eighth and final episode, with the show having debuted in November 2022 and airing until January 2023. “Willow” continued the story of the film of the same name, with Warwick Davis returning for the series in the title role of Willow Ufgood. The show was originally reported as being in the works at Disney+ back in 2019 and ordered to series in late 2020. Along with Davis, the cast of the show included Ruby Cruz, Erin Kellyman, Ellie Bamber, Tony Revolori, Amar Chadha-Patel, Dempsey Bryk, and Joanne Whalley. The official logline for the series states “In a magical world where brownies, sorcerers, trolls, and other mystical creatures flourish, the adventure continues, as an unlikely group of heroes set off on a dangerous quest to places far beyond their home, where they must face their inner demons and come together to save their world.”

EW in December. “It was not a decision that was ever made because we thought we needed queer representation in the show or that that was something we were intent on doing. What was clear was that we wanted to put at the center of this story a daughter for Madmartigan, who was torn between two people.

EXCLUSIVE: There will be no second season of Willow, Disney+’s live-action original series based on the 1988 fantasy film directed by Ron Howard. The news comes two months after the eight-episode first season of the show, which served as a sequel to the classic movie, ended its run on the streaming platform.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Warner Bros. Discovery and Amazon Prime Video have set the launch date and pricing for their ‘Warner Pass’ offer in France to March 16. Priced at €9.99 per month, the offer will be available exclusively on Amazon Prime Video Channels in France, and will boast all of HBO programs, along with 12 channels, including Warner TV, Eurosport, Discovery Channel, Cartoon Network and CNN, as well as their associated on-demand services. Subscribers will benefit from a 30-day free trial until April 3. “The launch of Warner Pass exclusively as a Prime Video channel in France is the next step in our journey to become the destination for customers in France to find the best in storytelling, premium entertainment and sports,” said Brigitte Ricou-Bellan, Prime Video French Country Director.

which first reported the news, “in her new role, Imperato Stabile will lead the division responsible for all aspects of the Warner Bros.

EXCLUSIVE: Stephanie Sperber has stepped down from her post as President of Imagine Kids & Family after four years to focus on producing. In the interim, the label’s slate will be overseen by Karen Lunder, President of Imagine Features, and Kristen Zolner, President of Imagine Television.

Japanese streamer U-Next has renewed its content deal with Warner Bros Discovery, under which it will continue to be the SVOD streaming home of HBO programming in Japan. 

The next instalment in the “Alien” franchise is set to take off.

Marc Malkin Senior Film Awards, Events & Lifestyle Editor In the final stretch to the Oscars, Hollywood’s A-List and industry insiders get their party on in the days and nights leading up to the big show. From Gina Prince-Bythewood being among the honorees at Essence’s Black Women in Hollywood Awards and a Friday night Versace fashion show to a celebration of Kerry Condon, Jessie Buckley and Eve Hewson at the Oscar Wilde Awards, this year’s Academy Award soirres and events are in full swing. Of course, the partying continues into the wee hours after the awards are handed out. Here, Variety gives you this year’s ultimate Oscar party guide.

Yesterday, it was announced that actress Isabela Mercer (“Rosaline”) would be joining fellow rising star Cailee Spaeny (“Mare of Easttown”) in the next big “Alien” feature film that is being spearheaded by filmmaker Fede Álvarez (“The Evil Dead”) and frequent writing partner Rodo Sayagues with Ridley Scott producing via his production company Scott Free.

Naman Ramachandran A rerelease of “Superman the Movie” will kick off a year-long 100th anniversary celebration of Warner Bros. Studios across the U.K. and Ireland, Warner Bros. Discovery has revealed. Warner Bros. was founded by Albert, Sam, Harry and Jack Warner and incorporated on Apr. 4, 1923. The “Superman” rerelease at BFI Southbank and BFI Imax in April will coincide with the 85th anniversary of the character. The rerelease of “The Exorcist” in September will celebrate the 50th anniversary of the horror classic. An Imax version of “Elf” will be released in November. In Ireland, a restored “Cool Hand Luke” screening kicked off the celebrations on Feb. 27, in partnership with the Dublin International Film Festival. The event also featured a Q&A with Oscar-nominated filmmaker Lenny Abramson, discussing the impact of the film as a key influence on his career. 

Batman fans have clamored for a while now that Willem Dafoe would be a great fit to play The Joker in a movie at some point. And Dafoe has acknowledged that interest, like in his monologue when he hosted “Saturday Night Live” last year.

trailer, Jack Black plays the villain Bowser, who directs his army of Koopa Troopas to burn down a kingdom belonging to penguins in search of a star that will grant him invincibility.The movie is directed by Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic (“Teen Titans Go!”, “Teen Titans Go! To the Movies”) from a screenplay by Matthew Fogel (“The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part”, “Minions: The Rise of Gru”).

The highly anticipated Illumination Entertainment/Universal movie The Super Mario Bros. Movie will be opening on Wednesday, April 5 around the world before Easter weekend instead of Good Friday, April 7.