English Entertainment
TWI renews deal for distribution of Manchester United Television
MUMBAI: TWI has been re-appointed to distribute Manchester United Television (MUTV). This is the daily football club channel and the deal is for the next three seasons.
For the last contract, TWI had secured deals in India, the Middle and Far East, Europe and Africa. This was in addition to established deals in New York and Scandinavia.
Under the new contract, both TWI and MUTV expect to venture into many more countries as the demand for club channel content grows. Now its new enhanced TV package, which can been seen everyday, will include live coverage of United’s USA tour matches against Bayern Munich, Celtic and AC Milan.
There will be delayed full coverage of all 38 Premier League matches as well as delayed full coverage of all Uefa Champions’ League matches. Another feature will be expert analysis of matches by the players themselves from MUTV’s studio inside the Trafford Training Centre.
English Entertainment
Ellison takes his Paramount-Warner Bros case straight to theater owners
The Skydance chief goes to CinemaCon with promises and a skeptical crowd waiting
CALIFORNIA: David Ellison strode into a room packed with thousands of cinema owners and executives at CinemaCon in Las Vegas on Thursday and did something rather bold: he looked them in the eye and asked them to trust him.
The chief executive of Paramount Skydance vowed that his company would release a minimum of 30 films a year if regulators greenlight its proposed $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery, a deal that has made theater owners deeply, and loudly, nervous.
“I wanted to look every single one of you in the eye and give you my word,” Ellison told the crowd. “Once we combine with Warner Bros, we are going to make a minimum of 30 films annually across both studios.”
It was a confident pitch. Whether it landed is another matter. Cinema operators have already called on regulators to block the deal, and scepticism in the room was hardly concealed.
Ellison pushed back by pointing to recent form. Paramount, born from the merger of Paramount Global and Skydance Media last August, plans to release 15 films this year, nearly double the eight it put out in 2025. Progress, he argued, was already underway.
He also threw theater owners a bone they have long been chasing: all films, he pledged, would run exclusively in cinemas for a minimum of 45 days, drawing applause from a crowd that has spent years fighting for exactly that commitment across the industry.
“People can speculate all they want,” Ellison said, “but I am standing here today telling you personally that you can count on our complete commitment. And we’ll show you we mean it.”
Fine words. The regulators, however, will have the last one.
