English Entertainment
CBS bags the rights to telecast the Hollywood Film Awards
MUMBAI: With the awards season just round the corner, news is CBS has struck a deal with Dick Clark Productions for exclusive broadcast rights of the Hollywood Film Awards, a relatively lesser known fest that has never had the privilege of television exposure.
Created 17 years ago by Carlos de Abreu, the Hollywood Film Awards ceremony hasn’t really managed to grab eyeballs in comparison to the Oscars or Golden Globes, but it what it has managed in recent years is to draw A-listers to attend the show. The event has typically taken place in the fall and is seen as the unofficial starter for awards season. The most recent Hollywood Film Awards were held in October at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.
The channel already boasts of the exclusive rights for the Grammy Awards and the Academy of Country Music Awards, but is yet to announce an air date for its first telecast of the Hollywood Film Awards. According to reports the show’s initial telecast would likely be either late this year or, should the network decide to heat up the action, move the franchise closer to the Globes and Oscars, early next year.
With no dearth of awards shows on television, many continue to draw strong ratings. Live events such as sports and awards shows are seen as more valuable in this digital age where people have the facility to record and keep their favourite shows for leisure viewing.
What remains to be seen is if CBS manages to steal the Golden Globes from the NBC network in the coming years, as the event is also created by Dick Clark Productions.
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.
