News Broadcasting
Sopranos star Gandolfini inks production deal with HBO
MUMBAI: Extending his alliance with HBO beyond next year’s final episodes of The Sopranos, the three-time Emmy winner James Gandolfini has signed a three-year production deal with HBO.
As per the deal, Gandolfini will develop projects exclusively for HBO and its specialty movie division, Picturehouse.
The actor has also announced his plans to launch a production company called Attaboy Films with partner Alex Ryanhas.
The biopic Hemingway will be Gandolfini’s first projects as a producer. Reportedly, Gandolfini and Ryan are also working on a documentary for HBO about US soldiers in Iraq.
Gandolfini has won three Emmys for playing Tony Soprano. His noted works also include Get Shorty and The Last Castle.
News Broadcasting
News TV viewership jumps 33 per cent as West Asia war draws audiences
BARC Week 8 data shows news share rising to 8 per cent despite T20 World Cup
NEW DELHI:Â Even as individual television news channel ratings remain under a temporary pause, the genre itself is seeing a clear surge in audience attention.
According to the latest data from Broadcast Audience Research Council India, television news recorded a 33 per cent jump in genre share in Week 8 of 2026, covering February 28 to March 6.
The news genre accounted for 8 per cent of total television viewership during the week, up from 6 per cent the previous week. The spike in attention coincided with escalating geopolitical tensions involving the United States, Israel and Iran, which have kept global headlines firmly fixed on West Asia.
The rise is notable because it came at a time when cricket was dominating television screens. The high-stakes stages of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup, including the Super 8 fixtures and semi-finals, were being broadcast during the same period.
Despite the cricket frenzy, viewers appeared to be toggling between sport and global affairs, boosting the overall share of news programming.
The surge in genre share comes even as the government has enforced a one-month pause on publishing ratings for individual news channels. The move followed regulatory scrutiny of the television ratings ecosystem.
While channel-level rankings remain temporarily out of sight, the genre-level data suggests that when global tensions escalate, audiences continue to turn to television news for real-time updates.
