English Entertainment
Blinkbox offering free preview of US pilots
MUMBAI: Blinkbox has reached agreements with Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment, Warner Bros, HBO and BBC Worldwide to offer customers a free preview of pilot episodes of series before purchasing.
From 24 July to 19 August, customers can preview such series as True Blood, Supernatural, The Americans, The Following and The Wire. Also included are The Big Bang Theory, The Newsroom, Entourage, American Horror Story, Arrow, Veep and The Vampire Diaries, among others. Customers can try as many shows as they’d like during the period.
Blinkbox’s CEO Michael Comish commented: “Great TV continues to be one of our biggest obsessions and the fuel for many conversations. There’s more choice than ever before thanks to services like ours and our insights told us that customers relished the opportunity to try TV before committing to purchase. After all, life’s too short to watch something that you’re just not into.”
“We think you should be able to enjoy great TV all year round, anytime and anywhere, not just when programs are scheduled. We’re confident that we have the best selection of great TV, so offering a teaser for free seems like a good way to introduce people to our service. We’re delighted to be able to say ‘try TV on us”, he adds.
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.
