For a third week in a row, The Watcher was the most streamed program for the week of Oct. 24, according to the Nielsen Streaming Top 10 list.
Netflix’s Wednesday scared up a big audience during its opening week. The supernatural-infused mystery series about the Addams daughter and her stint at Nevermore Academy amassed 341.23 million hours viewed since its Nov. 23 debut, marking a new record for the most hours viewed in a week for an English-language TV series on Netflix.
A media sector squeezed by streaming losses, anemic stocks, layoffs and executive turmoil unveiled its latest casualties Tuesday: 20% of AMC Networks’ U.S. staff, or about 200 people, along with the departure of CEO Christina Spade. The news follows Bob Chapek’s equally sudden departure last Sunday from Disney after a quarter of hefty streaming losses and months of PR missteps.
Warner Bros. TV group boss Channing Dungey has said there is a “tremendous amount of ambition” for a Harry Potter TV series. Responding to Variety‘s question about whether a TV project set in the wizarding world might be coming, following the success of the Harry Potter reunion and Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses, a competition show hosted by Helen Mirren, Dungey said “there’s lot of interest and a lot of passion for it” and that the company was speaking to a number of parties about it.
Exclusives
Jennifer Salke just got a big vote of confidence at Amazon Studios. The head of Amazon Studios has just been handed total control of MGM’s film and television divisions following the retail giant/streamer’s February acquisition of the storied studio behind the James Bond and Rocky/Creed franchises. The Salke announcement is but one of multiple staffing moves announced via a trio of internal memos late Tuesday.
Walker and Walker Independence kick off the returns on Jan. 12 with other shows debuting through Feb. 11.
NEW YORK (AP) — Clarence Gilyard Jr., a popular supporting actor whose credits include the blockbuster films “Die Hard” and “Top Gun” and the hit television series “Matlock” and “Walker, Texas Ranger,” has died at age 66. His death was announced this week by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, where he taught stage and […]
ViX, TelevisaUnivision’s streaming service launched this year dedicated to Spanish-language content, was named Apple TV App of The Year as part of Apple’s 2022 App Store Awards that spotlights the best apps of the year. For over a decade, Apple has honored the best apps and games for delivering exceptional experiences to users across Apple devices […]
The Parents Television and Media Council (PTC) is urging Hollywood and corporate America to stop the sexualization of children, in light of the sexually exploitative Balenciaga ad campaign that showed small children holding teddy bears dressed in bondage gear, and has launched a petition to hold these companies accountable. PTC President Tim Winter said: “Earth to corporate America: the sexualization of […]
The Voice led Monday both in total viewers (6.4 million) and in the demo (0.7), ticking up week-to-week. ABC’s The Great Christmas Light Fight returned to 2.7 million and a 0.4, improving in viewers vs. its year-ago season premiere and up in both measures from last season’s finale.
The new deals cover 25 markets and run through Dec. 31, 2024.
The Heartland Network, Retro TV, Rev’n, The Action Channel and The Family Channel have made their way to Las Vegas. These Luken.TV digital broadcast networks are available via a new television station, KVGA-LD, owned and operated by Digital Networks LLC. Viewers in the Las Vegas area will need to rescan their televisions to tune into […]
In a surprising move, AMC Networks Chief Executive Officer Christina Spade has stepped down from her role after only three months. In a short statement, the AMC Networks board of directors said it is finalizing who it will name as a replacement.
The Survivor mastermind follows film chiefs Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy out the door as Amazon takes full control of the studio.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — A documentary on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s life and groundbreaking political career, shot and edited by her daughter, will debut on HBO next month. Alexandra Pelosi’s “Pelosi in the House” will premiere Dec. 13 and will include footage shot during the Jan. 6 insurrection. Some of that footage, including moments when […]
NBC Sunday Night Football‘s coverage of the Packers/Eagles game averaged 16.2 million total viewers and a 4.2 demo rating — up some 20% from last week’s prelims to match the program’s best overnight tallies since Oct. 16 (when the Eagles bested the Cowboys).
Sinclair’s Diamond RCNs Hit By Subscriber Churn
Third quarter media revenues were down 10% to $684 million. Distribution revenues dropped 11% to $565 million and advertising revenues declined 5% to $112 million. However, Sinclair COO Robert Weisbord had some good news: “On a per-game basis, ad revenues were up by a mid-teens percent, driven by healthy demand in many categories — with the largest gains in service, retail, food and entertainment,” he reported. “Looking forward, we see some positive signs for advertising demand.”
Bruce Christensen, who led PBS from the mid-1980s to the early ’90s amid attacks on public TV for airing controversial documentaries, died Nov. 19 at his home in Orem, Utah. He was 79. PBS President Paula Kerger called Christensen “a giant of public television.”
Can technology boost engagement in sports programming?
Distributed production can deliver more of the angles, replays, graphics and insights that viewers want while tuned into a game, match or other competition. To maximize what goes on screen, supporting technology must use automation and metadata to make it easy for producers to access exactly what they need to work on at exactly the right time.
Some people turn on closed captions because they like how it helps them understand the plotlines of shows and movies, and multitask in front of the tube. Others turn them on because they can’t hear what actors are saying. That doesn’t always mean they are hard of hearing. Muddled audio is the top reason why more people are watching video with on-screen text, according to a May survey commissioned by language-teaching app Preply. As more video-production studios embrace advanced audio formats for at-home content, not every device can keep up. Plenty of viewers can’t keep up, either.
The eventual demise of its DVD-by-mail service has been inevitable since co-CEO Reed Hastings decided to spin it off from a then-nascent video streaming service in 2011. Back then, Hastings floated the idea of renaming the service as Qwikster — a bungled idea that was so widely ridiculed that it was satirized on Saturday Night Live. It finally settled on its current, more prosaic handle, DVD.com. The operation is now based in non-descript office in Fremont, Calif., located about 20 miles from Netflix’s sleek campus in Los Gatos, Calif.
The Cowboys 28-20 victory on Fox averaged 42 million viewers, according to Nielsen, surpassing the 41.55 million average for the Dec. 3, 1990, Monday night game between the Giants and San Francisco 49ers on ABC. Average viewer record numbers date to 1988.
