Some of Hollywood’s most prolific and established producers weighed in on the Paramount-Warner Bros. Discovery merger while walking the red carpet at the Producers Guild Awards in Los Angeles on Saturday night.
“It’s sad. Unfortunately, a lot of people are going to lose their jobs, and that’s not good, but (Paramount Skydance Chairman and CEO) David Ellison loves movies. He’s going to make a lot of movies, and that’s a good thing,” said industry veteran Jerry Bruckheimer, who was nominated by the PGA for producing Apple’s “F1: The Movie.”
Does Bruckheimer think it’s possible for Ellison to deliver on his promise to release 30 feature films a year? “I’m sure he can try,” he said. “At least he’s trying instead of saying, ‘I’m going to make five movies.'”
Warner Bros. Discovery has agreed to be acquired by Paramount Skydance in an $110 billion deal reached Friday after Netflix decided to back out of its bid for the studio.
Jason Blum, this year’s PGA Milestone Award recipient, said he believes “consolidation is overblown.”
He pointed to 10 years ago, when Netflix, Amazon and Apple were just starting to become more active in film and television.
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“So you’ve got three major new buyers, so I don’t think it’s surprising that the studios are going to consolidate,” Blum said. “But I think David really believes in the theatrical business and loves movies, and I think he’ll take great care of Warner Bros.”
Mr Blum acknowledged there was a “real fear” that people would lose their jobs as a result of the merger. “It’s never been this bad,” he said. “It’s a very real fear and, you know, only the government can stop it, but it’s a real fear. That’s always the downside of integration.”
Mara Brock Akil, this year’s recipient of the Norman Lear Achievement Award, said there are still too many unknowns to form a final opinion. “I think that’s what’s scary about this case,” she said. “What do you do when you’re scared? Do you crawl into a corner or take action? I think we need to decide as a community who we want to be as artists and have a clear conversation with who will be the most powerful studio in the world…We need to start doing that now.”
Charles Roven doesn’t necessarily feel bad about Netflix’s loss to Paramount. “Paramount, the Ellisons were incredibly aggressive. Ted (Sarandos) got a good deal where he got $2.8 billion in break-up money, so no one is crying for him,” he said. “There’s still a lot of work to do, so we’ll see how it goes. It’s going to be interesting to see how the various states and the Department of Justice view this deal, because… Paramount and Skydance have what Warner Bros. has, which is what CNN and CBS and HBO Max and Paramount+ have.”
Roven, whose credits include about a dozen Batman and Superman films at Warner Bros., believes the combined studio could release 30 films a year if each studio remained somewhat independent. “If[Ellison]keeps Warners separate from Paramount, that’s probably possible,” he said. “I think it’s going to be difficult depending on the guy at the top and how much of a dominant presence David is at the top, because I don’t think he’ll have the time to really dissect 30 movies. I don’t think so. Maybe his talent is that good. I don’t know.”
Funny or Die CEO Mike Farrar said he was hesitant to give an opinion because “we want to give people time to figure it out.”
But then, Farah said, “Generally speaking, a lot of people, and I agree with that, believe that this is not good for Hollywood, because it’s a form of consolidation and it’s going to have an impact. There’s a lot of turmoil and change going on right now, so I just want to take a breather. Let’s see if any of it passes. It probably will. And let’s just take people at their word.”
“Hamnet” producer Pippa Harris fears there will be one less studio to sell her product to. “I hope that whoever ends up running Warner Bros. will keep it as a working, successful studio and make the kind of films that were successful this year,” she said.
(Photo: Jason Blum, Mara Brock Akil, Jerry Bruckheimer)
