Know What's Happening in Entertainment
Know What's Happening in Entertainment
Nintendo and Illumination target $200M-plus Easter opening for “Super Mario Galaxy”
The upcoming “Super Mario Galaxy” film is being positioned to generate more than $200 million domestically over the Easter holiday weekend, leveraging the franchise’s multigenerational appeal. Analysts reference the 2015 “Avengers: Age of Ultron” $191 million opening as a performance benchmark.
Also developing:
By the numbers: K‑Love seeks FCC approval to acquire WFCC
BIScience has launched the TV Intelligence Suite, extending its AdClarity platform to include U.S. linear TV data. The upgrade lets customers monitor more than $174 billion in digital ad spend and $51 billion in linear TV spend from a single interface. Coverage spans over 100 networks and provides DMA‑level breakdowns alongside existing digital, social, video and CTV insights. The solution is powered by AdClarity’s AI‑driven infrastructure and is already available to enterprise clients in the United States.
Paramount+ and CBS have agreed to jointly broadcast UFC 327, featuring Jiří Procházka vs. Valter Ulberg, on April 11 from Miami’s Kaseya Center. Paramount+ will stream the entire fight card in the United States and Latin America, while CBS will simulcast the...
Offscript Worldwide, the parent company behind the Revolt media property, announced the launch of 3BlackDot, a consumer‑facing gaming media platform. The debut featured its flagship show, 3BD Weekly, streamed live from SXSW. 3BlackDot is positioned as a centralized hub that...
M&A activity in the United States has slumped, with announced mergers dropping 23% to 1,795 by March 9, while sports and e‑sports deals fell to just five this year versus 57 in 2025. The downturn is driven by the February “SaaS‑pocalypse,”...
Coinbase debuted a new Oscar‑time commercial titled “Your Way Out,” featuring a video‑game non‑playable character who rebels against his scripted existence. The ad, created by Isle of Any and directed by Oscar Hudson, positions the crypto platform as a pathway...
TikTok Radio is relaunching on March 13 via the iHeartRadio app and on 28 iHeartMedia broadcast stations after ending its four‑year SiriusXM partnership. The new channel blends music, creator‑led conversation, and signature segments such as ‘Behind‑the‑Charts’ and ‘Hacks on the :20s.’...
Vibe.co, a streaming‑TV ad platform, launched a bicoastal out‑of‑home campaign targeting enterprise ecommerce marketers, SaaS leaders, AI founders and venture capitalists. The effort places billboards, subway ads, buses and taxi tops in New York and the San Francisco Bay Area, featuring...
Konami announced that its Silent Hill 2 remake has reached 5 million copies sold worldwide across digital, physical, and subscription channels. To celebrate, the publisher launched a Spring Sale on the PlayStation Store, offering the Deluxe Editions of Silent Hill 2 and Silent...
Venu Holding announced an $86 million oversubscribed public equity offering, selling 18.75 million shares at $4 each and adding warrants for additional purchases. The capital will fund new venues in Texas and Oklahoma, repay a $4.35 million promissory note, and support working capital....
RTL Group reported a 3.8% drop in total revenues to €6.02 billion, but announced that its streaming portfolio is poised to become profitable this year after nearing break‑even at the end of 2025. Subscriber numbers rose to 8.06 million in 2025 and...
Only 53% of U.S. adults reported going to a movie theater in the past year, according to a Pew Research Center survey, while 7% have never attended. Ticket sales remain about 20% below pre‑pandemic levels, with 769.2 million tickets sold in...
Canal+ Africa warned that DStv’s steep entry price is stalling subscriber growth in Anglophone Africa. Installation costs average €38 per household, nearly three times the €13 seen in Canal+‑run Francophone markets, contributing to a drop from 14.9 million to 14.4 million subscribers...
Create Music Group has adopted Astronomer’s managed Apache Airflow service to orchestrate more than 600 data pipelines that feed real‑time streaming and revenue analytics. The switch from legacy cron jobs and Cloud Composer to Astro has accelerated pipeline development by...
Ford is testing a micro‑docuseries on Apple TV that tells a multi‑episode story about its return to Formula One, using streaming ad slots instead of traditional 30‑second spots. The campaign places each short episode alongside race‑weekend coverage, highlighting engineers and power‑unit development....
The Digital Publishing Partnership (DPP) released the "Making Data Pay" report, drawing insights from over 70 contributors across 19 content organisations and 19 vendors. It examines data use in four core media functions—management, audience engagement, strategy, and technology—revealing that heavy...
A University of Bristol and Meaning Machine study of 68 gamers playing the AI‑driven murder‑mystery game Dead Meat found overwhelming approval for AI‑powered NPCs. Ninety‑five percent rated the experience enjoyable, while 97% found it rewarding, and 75% felt they could...
Starting in June, PEGI will assign a PEGI 16 rating to any game that includes paid random items such as loot boxes, while social‑casino titles move to PEGI 18. The new framework also grades in‑game purchases, daily‑quest incentives and unrestricted online chat,...
Nielsen unveiled a new upfront planning guide that offers a granular look at ad‑supported TV viewership across linear, FAST and AVOD platforms, with a focus on the 18‑49 demographic and sports audiences. The study shows adults 18‑49 allocate 63.8% of...
Tim Burrowes’ Unmade Index, which monitors 14 Australian listed media firms, has recorded a more than 60% drop in total market value since its launch in early 2022, underscoring a deepening media apocalypse. The latest Mumbrellacast episode also dissects the...
At the London Book Fair, a panel of publishing leaders highlighted licensing as a critical growth engine, especially as large language models demand high‑quality text. They urged publishers to adopt a pragmatic stance—accepting imperfect licenses rather than forgoing deals—to capture...
Natalie Waller has been re‑elected chair of the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) board, marking her second term since first breaking the glass ceiling in 2021. Sean Warner, president of Universal Music Australia & New Zealand, joins as deputy chair, bringing...
Canal+ will retire Showmax, migrating South African subscribers to its own OTT app after Showmax accumulated roughly R8.7 billion in losses, including R4.9 billion in 2025. The transition will fold Showmax titles into the Canal+ platform and DStv Stream, aiming to retain customers...
Amazon MX Player, India’s free streaming service with 250 million monthly viewers, announced its most ambitious 2026 lineup. The slate features over 150 new and returning titles across drama, action, reality and its micro‑drama MX Fatafat vertical. High‑profile projects such as...
The video‑game music sync market is valued at $1.91 billion in 2026 and growing 7.7% annually, projected to hit $3.73 billion by 2035. Indie developers typically allocate $500‑$2,000 per track, a budget far more approachable than film and TV sync fees. Because...
Dream Sports, the owner of fantasy platform Dream11, has restructured its operations after the Indian government's ban on real‑money gaming, resulting in the departure of more than 100 senior staff. The company split its workforce of roughly 950 employees among...
The Victorian Football League has secured broadcast agreements with Foxtel, ABC, Seven and SEN, promising the competition’s biggest audiences in decades. Foxtel will stream 16 matches on Kayo Sports across the first 13 rounds, while ABC returns to VFL TV...
In this special edition of the Behind the Numbers podcast, eMarketer analyst Emmy Liederman moderates a panel with Nicole Marcus of Dick's Sporting Goods and Alison O'Keefe of Best Buy about the evolving creator video landscape and its migration from...
Harvard‑trained physician Nick Norwitz leveraged his Metabolic Health YouTube channel to drive a dramatic surge in paid Substack subscribers, climbing from 900 to 5,200 in eight months. Partnering with creator‑management firm Shorthand Studios, he applied A/B testing, refined branding, and...
A Looper Insights survey of sports‑media executives finds global streamers poised to dominate sports rights by 2026, with Amazon Prime Video emerging as the clear front‑runner. Forty‑one percent of respondents said streaming platforms will hold the greatest structural power, edging...
Scoop: Gayle King's new deal, which CBS News triumphantly announced last week, is only a one-year renewal, I've learned. It does not lock King into the network past 2027.
Summit Technology Group unveiled AirLux Studio Signaling, a network‑based on‑air light replacement that uses PoE‑powered touchscreen displays. The platform integrates natively with Axia Livewire consoles, automatically reflecting status cues such as On‑Air, Recording, or Production in Progress. A centralized web...
1) They wouldn't make the same amount of money because their own time has a cost. 2) How is Garbage going to meaningfully expand their base at this stage in their career? But i'll give it to you as...
NEW: The CNN–CBS Marriage Plot: • Will Bari Weiss expand her remit? • Who will actually run the network? • How much will David Ellison cut, and how will he cut? • And where does Trump factor in? https://t.co/BuiVS0srnq @PuckNews
Suzette Quintanilla, sister of late singer Selena, filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in California accusing Chinese fast‑fashion retailer Shein of trademark infringement, unfair competition, and publicity‑rights violations. The suit alleges Shein continued to sell unlicensed Selena t‑shirts and...
Big news. The highest praise for NBCUniversal Chairman Donna Langley and her team Pete Levinsohn and Jim Orr. Giving us hits like The Super Mario Galaxy Movie (opening April 1). AND Universal is significantly lengthening the time that movies will...
Sony at 13x EV/EBIT ahead of the GTA 6 release on 19 November 2026 https://t.co/FBeFJ5c7Bp
Australia’s High Court ruled in favor of Sydney‑based fashion designer Katie Perry, allowing her to market clothing under her own name. The decision overturns a prior ruling that had limited the pop star Katy Perry’s trademark to music and entertainment,...
We should remember that “tickets sold” is an estimate based these days on details coming from outside analytics companies that don’t have access to all the facts.
Don’t know about you, but I counted about eight of these brands that are clearly melting ice cubes that survived only because the cable bundle was the only game in town.
Fox One and ESPN Unlimited are refining their direct‑to‑consumer (DTC) platforms to tackle sports‑viewing fragmentation, ingestion hurdles, and personalization demands. Fox targets the 60 million cord‑less households, offering the same lineup as pay‑TV and a joint ESPN bundle at $39.99 per...
The Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) partnered with Scripps Sports to broadcast its New York Sirens versus Montréal Victoire matchup on March 28, marking the league’s first nationally televised game. The contest aired on Ion Television, which reaches over 126 million U.S....
Comcast finished extending its Xfinity fiber network in Clark County, Washington, bringing high‑speed symmetrical internet to roughly 500 homes northeast of Battle Ground Lake. Meanwhile, Charter announced a Spectrum fiber rollout in Washtenaw County, Michigan, slated to connect nearly 1,000 addresses across...
Disney’s incoming chief executive Josh D’Amaro has appointed Paul Roeder as senior EVP and chief communications officer, effective next Thursday. Roeder, a 25‑year Disney veteran, will direct worldwide communications, public‑relations strategy, media relations, executive messaging, editorial oversight, employee engagement and...
March Madness drove record TV audiences, with ESPN delivering its most‑watched men’s college basketball season since 2014‑15, averaging 1.1 million viewers across 127 games. ABC’s five tournament events pulled 1.7 million viewers, while ESPN’s family of networks posted a 25% year‑over‑year increase....
Alliance Entertainment reported Q4 2025 net income of $9.4 million, up from $7.1 million a year earlier, driven by higher margins and a shift toward premium physical media and collectibles. Adjusted EBITDA rose to $18.5 million and gross margin expanded...
Craig Hutchison’s Sports Entertainment Network has expanded its flagship Giddy Up program, now broadcasting live for four hours, five days a week on Racing.com via 7plus. The show, hosted by Gareth Hall, is Australia’s most syndicated radio show, airing across...
Xbox announced it will re‑release several unnamed iconic games in 2026 as part of its 25th‑anniversary celebration. The company’s dedicated game preservation team has spent years building system‑level emulation and adding modern enhancements such as auto HDR and FPS boost....
Informa TechTarget, the 2024 merger of Informa and TechTarget, reported full‑year revenue of $486.8 million and an adjusted EBITDA of $87.3 million for 2025, surpassing its $85 million guidance. The company projected 2026 adjusted EBITDA between $95 million and $100 million, signaling a return to...
The Golden State Warriors posted their lowest‑rated ABC broadcast since 2002, drawing a 1.1 rating and 1.90 million viewers in a Curry‑less matchup against the Thunder. Historically a marquee NBA draw, the team’s viewership fell sharply when Stephen Curry missed his...
1. Was never a lock. 2. Movie didn’t and likely will not get to $100m domestic 3. Still might win.
