English Entertainment
AXN to unveil three new shows in September
MUMBAI: Come September and there will be more action on AXN. The channel has lined up the third season of CSI Miami, which will go on air from Thursday, 1 September at 11 pm.
The channel will also kick off a new reality show The World’s Wildest Commercials every Wednesday from 7 September at 10 pm. Over 5000 commercial spots will be showcased – from a male stripper selling snack food to a talking chimp selling a cable television service. The thread that binds the content is the commonality of the storytelling style.
AXN will also air another new show Las Vegas every Wednesday at 11 pm from 14 September. The drama follows a surveillance team as it maintains security of Las Vegas casino and resort.
They have to deal with card counting cheats, streaks of random luck on the part of casino visitors, which prove costly. Then there is the threat of rival casinos trying to woo their high rollers. It stars James Caan of The Godfather, Misery.
Apart from that, the finale of the fifth season of CSI on AXN has a terrific scene, which will be aired on 8 September at 11 pm Trapped in a coffin six feet under a crime scene investigator imagines that his body is being dissected on the autopsy slab by a doctor while his father looks on. While the doctor pulls out body parts including intestines from the body the father asks him if the death was painful. The two of them even find time to crack jokes.
Mixing macabre with humour can be tricky but Quentin Tarantino pulls the feat off with considerable aplomb. The director of Pulp Fiction and Kill Bill directed the two part final episode called Grave Danger.
The coffin scenes reminded this writer of Tarantino’s film Kill Bill where Uma Thurman, in her quest to seek revenge, is also put in one. The crucial difference is that while Thurman is able to literally punch herself out of danger the unfortunate CSI investigator has to wait for help and try to avoid shooting himself in the meantime.
This special is a race against time as the CSI team led by William Peterson and Marg Helgenberger try to save one of their own before it is too late. Basically the investigator was kidnapped by someone baring a grudge. The dialogue is fast and witty and while Tarantino manages not to intrude on the show’s format he is able to bring his own unique touch to it. The deal came about as he is a big fan of the show. He is even said to be perhaps looking at creating a television series of his own.
In the US, the final episode managed to get over 30 million viewers making it the tenth time that CSI managed to achieve that. In Canada on CTV, Grave Danger managed a peak audience of 5.4 million viewers and an average of nearly five million. As far as specials go, only the Oscar Awards managed to get in more viewers. In the UK on Five (earlier Channel 5) the fifth season managed a weekly average of 3.3 million viewers.
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.
