Film Production
Star One brings FTII diploma films to television
MUMBAI: Star One has associated with the Film and Television Institute of India, Pune (FTII Pune) to telecast diploma films shot by the institute’s graduate students in its afternoon band on Sundays. The channel kicked off the initiative on 4 September.
Star One will telecast 16 films in eight weeks’ time – two films per week. Every film is of 22 minutes duration on an average. The films are being telecast between 2 pm and 4 pm.
Speaking to indiantelevision.com, FTII Pune director Tripurari Saran offers, “We have our festival Lensight in which the graduate students present their diploma films. This year, we had Star One as a sponsor of the event. Now, as part of the deal, we have given one time telecast rights of the films to the channel.”
Calling the initiative a ‘selfless one’, Star One programming head Ravi Menon expressed the hope that it would help the channel to introduce fresh talent to the television industry. “Today, television is on the lookout for creative brilliance in fields such as direction and editing. We hope that these kinds of associations would help fresh talent to get closer to the television industry,” he said
Film Production
Disney to cut 1,000 jobs under new chief executive
The entertainment giant’s freshly installed boss inherits a restructuring already in motion, with marketing and corporate roles bearing the brunt
CALIFORNIA: Walt Disney is preparing to slash up to 1,000 jobs in the coming weeks, the Wall Street Journal reported, as the entertainment giant’s freshly installed chief executive moves swiftly to trim fat and tighten the ship.
The cuts, less than 1 per cent of Disney’s global workforce of 231,000, will fall hardest on marketing and corporate roles. The planning, notably, began before D’Amaro formally took the top job in March, suggesting the new boss inherited a restructuring already in motion rather than one of his own making.
Driving the push is Asad Ayaz, Disney’s newly appointed chief marketing officer, who in January assumed command of a unified, company-wide marketing operation spanning film, television and streaming. His consolidation drive has been given a suitably cinematic internal name: Project Imagine.
The move is modest by Disney’s recent standards. Between 2023 and 2025, under former chief executive Bob Iger, the company eliminated roughly 8,000 positions across several brutal rounds of cuts, saving $7.5 billion, comfortably exceeding its own targets. As recently as June 2025, several hundred more jobs were axed across Disney Entertainment, hitting film and television marketing, publicity, casting, development and corporate finance.
Disney’s structural headaches are well-documented: shrinking streaming margins, a weakened box office, and fierce competition from Amazon and YouTube gnawing at its flanks. The company is merging its Disney+ and Hulu teams into a single app, has brought in consultants from Bain & Co to guide its broader cost strategy, and is betting heavily on digital growth.
The wider entertainment industry offers little comfort. Sony Pictures, Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery have all taken the knife to their workforces in recent years, and further cuts loom if Paramount’s acquisition of Warner goes through.
For D’Amaro, the message is clear: there will be no honeymoon period. The magic kingdom still has some cost-cutting spells left to cast.
