English Entertainment
Romedy NOW celebrates Womanhood with a unique line-up on 8th March
MUMBAI: Celebrate the myriad facets of a woman – fun and funny, tough and tender, witty and wise, intense and impish all at once! This Women’s Day, the exclusive English entertainment channel Romedy NOW celebrates with a lineup dedicated to the girls for what they are – bold and beautifulwith dollops of chutzpah! Enjoy the daylong marathon on Women’s Day, Saturday, 8 March, 8 AM-8 PMwith the best of movies.
The fashionable foursome Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte and Miranda are the Women of Substance in Sex and the City 2. Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) misses the freewheeling fun after getting married to Mr. Big, Samantha tries to stay young at 52, Charlotte battles her daughter Lily’s ‘terrible twos’, and Miranda quits her job because her boss cannot handle an intelligent and powerful woman like her. But when has mayhem stopped a girl from having fun? The awesome girls go on an all-expense paid trip to Abu Dhabi and experience one adventure after another in the UAE.
Be amazed by the brilliant Julia Roberts as she plays a single mother in Erin Brockovich, a legal assistant who almost single-handedly, brings down a Californian power supply giant to its knees for contaminating the city’s water – even if it means knocking from door to door with a toddler in tow.
Then be bedazzled with her bright smile in The Mona Lisa Smile where sheplays an art professor in the 1950s society, teaching girls to question their conservative societal roles.
There’s the glitz and glamour of the fashion world in The Devil Wears Prada as a young journalist Andrea Sachs (Anne Hathway) lands the job as second assistant to a powerful and demanding fashion mag editor Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep). As Andy transforms from geek to fashionista, she must make a choice between her dream job and her real life, love, friends and family.
There’s no age for being free-minded! Catch the fun punk rock loving teenager in Juno as she deals with an unplanned pregnancy at 16 and goes through the adult life with teenage fun and freshness.
In Her Shoes will treat you to two sisters who cannot see eye to eye. Throw in a hard to please grandmother who ultimately makes them get along with each other and you have the perfect combination of sibling rivalry and love.
The celebration is not just for a day. Sit with your feet up and relax with Sweet Nothings, a special slot every Wednesday at 1 PM. Your time, your space, your channel, filled with all the great stories of love and laughter at your fingertips.
Charlotte (Jennifer Lopez) has finally found the man of her dreams in Monster-in-Law but his mother Viola Fields (Jane Fonda) is a nightmare who won’t lose her son to Charlie. A fight to be the alpha-female ensues.
War of the roses ensues in Bride Wars when best friends Liv and Emma cross swords after their common wedding planner ends up scheduling their respective weddings on the same day at the same venue! No one will budge and change their wedding date and their claws are sharpened to sabotage the other’s wedding! Enjoy the hilarious ride.
Watch out for more moments of Sweet Nothings in Step Mom and more love in Letters to Juliet.
So let your hair down and enjoy the special treats this Women’s Day only on Romedy NOW!
English Entertainment
Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders approve Paramount deal
Investors wave through a $111 billion megamerger but deliver a stinging, if toothless, rebuke over half-a-billion-dollar goodbye packages
NEW YORK: The shareholders said yes to the deal. They said no to the cheque. At a virtual special meeting on Thursday that lasted barely ten minutes, Warner Bros. Discovery investors voted overwhelmingly to approve Paramount Skydance’s $111 billion acquisition of the company — and then turned around and voted against the lavish exit pay packages lined up for chief executive David Zaslav and his fellow outgoing executives.
Not that it will make much difference. The compensation vote is purely advisory and non-binding. The Warner Bros. Discovery board can, and almost certainly will, pay out as planned.
But the symbolism stings. It is the second consecutive year that WBD shareholders have voted against the executive compensation packages, and this time they had good reason. Zaslav’s exit deal is, by any measure, extraordinary. Under the terms filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, he is set to receive $34.2 million in cash severance, $517.2 million in equity in the combined company, and $44,195 in continued health coverage — a total of at least $550 million. On top of that, Warner Bros. Discovery has agreed to reimburse Zaslav up to $335 million for taxes assessed by the Internal Revenue Service on his accelerated stock vesting, though the company says that figure will decline depending on when the deal closes. As of March 11, Zaslav also held $115.85 million in vested WBD stock awards — and last month sold a further $114 million worth of WBD shares.
Shareholder advisory firm ISS recommended voting against the compensation measure, citing “problematic” tax reimbursements to Zaslav and the full vesting of his stock awards.
Zaslav will be bound by a two-year non-competition covenant and a two-year non-solicitation of customers and employees after the deal closes.
His lieutenants are not walking away empty-handed either. J.B. Perrette, chief executive and president of global streaming and games, is in line for $142 million, comprising $18.2 million in cash severance and $123.9 million in equity. Bruce Campbell, chief revenue and strategy officer, will receive an estimated $121.5 million, including $18.8 million in severance and $102.7 million in equity. Chief financial officer Gunnar Wiedenfels is set for $120 million, made up of $6.6 million in cash severance and $113.1 million in equity. Gerhard Zeiler, president of international, will get $82.6 million, including $11.9 million in severance and $70.7 million in equity.
The deal itself, clinched in February after Netflix declined to raise its bid for Warner Bros., still needs regulatory clearance from the Justice Department and European authorities. Several state attorneys general are also weighing legal action to block it.
Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, was unsparing. “The Paramount-Warner Bros. merger isn’t a done deal,” she said after the shareholder vote. “State attorneys general across the country are stepping up to stop this antitrust disaster. We need to keep up this fight.”
If it does go through, the combined entity would be a formidable beast, bringing together Paramount Skydance’s stable — CBS, CBS News, Paramount Pictures, Paramount+, BET, MTV and Nickelodeon — with WBD’s portfolio of HBO, Max, Warner Bros. film and TV studios, DC, CNN, TBS, TNT, HGTV and Discovery+. Paramount has said it expects $6 billion in cost savings from the merger, which is Wall Street shorthand for mass layoffs on a significant scale.
The ten-minute meeting was presided over by chairman Samuel Di Piazza Jr., with Zaslav, Campbell, Wiedenfels and chief communications officer Robert Gibbs in virtual attendance. Di Piazza was bullish. “We appreciate the support and confidence our stockholders have placed in us to unlock the full value of our world-class entertainment portfolio,” he said. “With Paramount, we look forward to creating an exceptional combined company that will expand consumer choice and benefit the global creative talent community.”
Zaslav echoed the sentiment. “Over the past four years, our teams have transformed Warner Bros. Discovery and returned the company to industry leadership,” he said. “Today’s stockholder approval is another key milestone toward completing this historic transaction that will deliver exceptional value to our stockholders.”
Paramount Skydance struck a similar note. “Shareholder approval marks another important milestone towards completing our acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery,” it said in a statement, adding that it looked forward to “closing the transaction in the coming months.”
The shareholders have spoken on the merger. On the pay, they were ignored before the vote was even counted.
