Hollywood Reporter: Hollywood’s Top Dealmakers of 2024

Story from Hollywood Reporter:

Some moguls may look at everything before Nov. 5 as a prelude to the frenzy of dealmaking to come if the new Trump administration turns out to be as amenable to M&A as it is widely expected to be. And yet, even before Election Day, dotted lines were signed for the sale of Paramount Global, two theme park giants teamed up to fight Universal and Disney in the lucrative experiences world, Gerry Cardinale and Jeff Zucker rolled up film and TV production companies, and Lionsgate became the first major studio to jump on a deal to train AI on its massive film and TV library. Not to be outdone, Netflix nabbed WWE ratings driver Raw while the NBA inked a set of multibillion-dollar rights deals that will set the league up for more than a decade to come. Now, meet the players as they unpack the logic behind those blockbuster pacts.

01: The Studio Merger of the Year

As far as deals go, there are few as complex and important to Hollywood in 2024 as Skydance’s $8 billion deal to acquire Paramount. Ellison’s company cut a deal to metabolize Redstone’s National Amusements, and will subsequently merge Skydance with Paramount to create the new company that will house the Paramount film and TV studios, CBS, Paramount+, MTV, Showtime and a slew of other assets. Notes Ropes & Gray attorney Oldshue, who advised National Amusements, “Ms. Redstone was single-mindedly focused on making sure not only that her family had a good outcome, but also that the company that she cared so much about — Paramount Global — and its stockholders had a good outcome.”

Assuming the deal is approved by regulators, the strategic vision of the new Paramount will be the talk of the town sometime in the first half of 2025 when the megamerger closes. “Our goal, David and my goal and the rest of the team, is to win. We want to make this company the leader in entertainment, and that goes for [direct-to-consumer streaming] too,” incoming president Jeff Shell told reporters in July. “So we’re going to be evaluating all options to be a winner in DTC, and to be a winner in DTC really means being in the ultimate bundle that’s coming. We’ve got a bunch of inbound from a number of people about partnerships that could involve a partnership with another player or players, and so we will evaluate all that.”

More Dealmakers: Eric Swedenburg and Katherine Krause from Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP (for Paramount); Faiza J. Saeed, Daniel J. Cerqueira and Claudia J. Ricciardi from Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP (for Paramount’s Special Committee); Emily Oldshue and Jackie Cohen from Ropes & Gray (for National Amusements); Alison Ressler and Eric Krautheimer from Sullivan & Cromwell LLP (for RedBird Capital); Justin Hamill, Bradley Faris, Ian Nussbaum, Max Schleusener, Rick Offsay, and Liliana Paparelli Ranger of Latham & Watkins (for Skydance)

02: The Blockbuster Sports Rights Deal of the Year

The NBA’s massive 11-year deals with Disney, Amazon and NBCUniversal will transform the TV landscape, with a slew of new games coming to broadcast TV and streaming platforms like Prime Video, Peacock and ESPN’s upcoming flagship service. Programming budgets will shift and schedules will change, but the NBA will be front and center in the emerging media landscape. “These were complex negotiations that required creative solutions,” Koenig says, adding that the deals will help the league “reimagine the live telecast experience and reach fans in new and innovative ways.”

More Dealmakers: The NBA’s Bill Koenig, content/media dist. exec; Disney’s Rosalyn Durant, exec vp programming/acquisitions; NBC Sports president Rick Cordella; Amazon’s Jay Marine, head of sports/ads for Prime Video; Charlie Neiman, head of sports partnerships.

03: The Massive Strikes That Were Averted

After the industry endured six months of strikes in 2023, there was a collective sigh of relief when the top negotiators for IATSE, the Hollywood Basic Crafts and the AMPTP kept the labor peace this year. During the talks, both IATSE and the L.A.-area Teamsters Local 399 (a member of the Hollywood Basic Crafts) prioritized wage gains, benefits funding, improvements to working conditions and restrictions on AI. Ultimately, union members ratified the deals, which included the largest general wage increases in more than 15 years. IATSE international president Loeb says that by the time the crew unions got to the bargaining table, “everybody was ready to get back to work.” AMPTP chief negotiator Lombardini praises the “close collaboration” with the unions that “have helped create a much stronger and more stable labor environment.”

04: Netflix Opens Its Wallet for Sports-ish Spending Spree

The “transformative” deal, as TKO president and COO Shapiro called it, is Netflix’s largest (by far) commitment to live programming to date and makes the WWE’s worldwide footprint much bigger, as Netflix will also carry its premium live events outside the U.S. “When you combine Netflix’s global reach and WWE Raw’s multigenerational fandom, we’ll be able to deliver more joy and value for our members while exposing a whole new global audience to this fantastic product,” says Brandon Riegg, vp nonfiction series and sports at Netflix.

302M:

That would be the average minutes viewed — in Netflix parlance — for an episode of WWE Monday Night Raw, using viewership figures from its latest season on USA Network as a guide. And that back-of-the-napkin math doesn’t factor in that Netflix will signal-boost its new sports-adjacent franchise in 2025 to its 240 million global subscribers, a far cry from the tens of millions that the show reached on USA.

05: Walmart Buys in to Cutthroat Streaming Game

It’s no coincidence that less than a month after Amazon Prime Video made its advertising tier the default for its subscribers in January, its major retail rival unveiled a deal to buy TV maker Vizio, run by CEO William Wang, to help power its own foray into raking in connected TV ad dollars. “The margins generally are pretty low on TVs today, the hardware,” Walmart CFO John David Rainey told a Bank of America investor event in June. “A lot of the money that’s being made there is in the software part of that, and we want to take advantage of that.” Vizio, and the data from its 18 million accounts, will help give Walmart a foothold in a battlefield that Roku, Samsung, Apple TV and, yes, Amazon (with its Fire TV) compete on. As the deal closed on Dec. 3, Seth Dallaire, chief growth officer, Walmart U.S, added: “Vizio has also expertly changed their business over time, like building and quickly scaling a profitable advertising business. Pairing it with Walmart Connect will be impactful and allow us to invest in our business even further on behalf of our customers.”

More Dealmakers: Rick Climan, Jane Ross and Katherine Keeley of Hogan Lovells (for Walmart); Rezwan Pavri, Marty Korman, Mark Bass, Ross Tanaka of Wilson Sonsini (for Vizio)

06: Bob Iger Aims to Future-Proof Disney

Disney’s February earnings call came amid a high-profile proxy battle, and it included a flurry of news, including Moana 2 and the Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour movie coming to Disney+. But one piece of news stood out: a $1.5 billion investment in Fortnite studio Epic Games and a promise to build a digital world connected to Fortnite, based on Disney IP. It’s a big bet on gaming from a company that has relied more on pure licensing deals in the past. “This is the future for our company,” Disney Experiences chairman D’Amaro says. “We know that younger audiences are engaging in the online space, in the gaming space in incredibly meaningful ways now, and we absolutely want to be there.”

07: Major Studio Gets Back Into the Theater Business

For the first time in decades, a big studio once again owns a cinema chain. In June, Sony bought Alamo to both prove its commitment to theatrical and find a new way to reach consumers. But Sony has no plans to be a traditional exhibitor and is letting Alamo do its own thing (including hosting video gaming events). “This deal brings an important and exciting addition to Sony Pictures’ portfolio as we continue to pursue new opportunities for experiential entertainment,” says Anguelova, Sony exec vp and global head of corporate development. She shepherded the deal with Alamo CEO Kustermann, who will keep running the circuit as head of a new division, Sony Pictures Experiences.

More Dealmakers: Sony Pictures Ent.’s Ravi Ahuja, president and COO; Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group’s Tom Rothman, chair/CEO; Alamo’s Tim League, founder

08: Major Theme Park Giants Unite

The merger of the two theme parks creates an entertainment behemoth, with 27 theme parks, 15 water parks, nine hotels and resorts, and more across the U.S., Canada and Mexico. This not only spreads out the real estate footprint of the two companies, but also better positions them to compete with Disney and Universal, which are upping their investments. The deal “will allow the combined company to take advantage of incredible growth opportunities,” says Kirkland & Ellis partner Jebejian, who advised Six Flags on this deal. “It will be exciting to see where management leads this company in the future.”

More Dealmakers: Michael J. Aiello, Matthew Gilroy of Weil (for Cedar Fair); Cip Beredo, Steve Mount, Julia Tosi and Carl Draucker of Squire Patton Boggs (for Cedar Fair); Sarkis Jebejian, Allie Wein and Emily Lichtenheld of Kirkland & Ellis LLP (for Six Flags)

09: Big 3 Agency Moving Away From Wall Street

Do investors really understand what agents do? That was the hope when Endeavor went public in 2021, and Emanuel has talked multiple times about the synergistic “flywheel” that agencies like WME and IMG bring to clients for sister businesses like PBR, hospitality firm On Location and betting platform OpenBet. But the Street didn’t buy it — at least the representation part of the equation. WME, in a deal set to close in 2025, will leave the public market via its private equity majority shareholder Silver Lake while PBR, On Location and IMG will migrate to TKO Holdings, the publicly traded sports powerhouse home to the WWE and UFC. And Emanuel is taking over the OpenBet and IMG Arena divisions in a $450 million deal to run those privately.

More Dealmakers: Justin Hamill, Michael Anastasio and Ian Nussbaum of Latham & Watkins (for Endeavor); Faiza J. Saeed and Claudia J. Ricciardi of Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP (for Endeavor’s Special Committee); Elizabeth Cooper, Chris May and Mark Myott of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP (for Silver Lake); Mark Boyagi, Jordan Murray, Eric Fischer, Kevin Lam and Leslie Hung of Kirkland & Ellis LLP (for Silver Lake)

10: A New Player in Film/TV Production Emerges

In May 2024, Jeff Zucker and Gerry Cardinale’s RedBird IMI closed its biggest deal to date, acquiring All3Media, the U.K.’s largest TV producer, from Warner Bros. Discovery and Liberty Global for a cool £1.15 billion ($1.45 billion). The deal, done over six months between leads Richard Birns and Nicholas Tomlison from Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP repping RedBird, and Bob Bishop and Jon Kenworthy of DLA Piper for WBD and Liberty, gives RedBird control of All3Media’s 50+ production banners from Sam Mendes’ Neal Street (Call the Midwife, 1917) and Two Brothers Pictures (Fleabag) in the U.K., to U.K.-based reality giant Studio Lambert (The Traitors, Squid Game: The Challenge).

“We dealt with the usual and customary issues you have to deal with in a carveout transaction – namely, making sure that all the assets, including contracts and employees all port seamlessly with the business your client is buying – with the added complication that All3 was itself held by a joint venture jointly held by Liberty Global and Warner Bros. Discovery,” says Birns and Tomlinson. “All sides had a “get the deal done” approach and so while there were complicated issues to sort out, all sides were able to work through these deal points constructively.”

All3Media is the new jewel in RedBird IMI’s growing empire, which includes unscripted production company EverWonder Studios, children’s entertainment group Hidden Pigeon Company, the digital news outlet Front Office Sports, and a stake in Media Res, the studio behind the Apple TV+ shows The Morning Show and Pachinko.

More Dealmakers: Richard Birns and Nicholas Tomlinson of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP (for RedBird); Bob Bishop and Jon Kenworthy of DLA Piper (for WBD, Liberty)

11: A New Vision to Rebuild the Cable Bundle

Building on its groundbreaking deal with Disney in 2023, cable operator Charter struck deals with the other major players that brought in streaming services at no extra charge (except for some package price hikes) to its cable customers. Montemagno, Charter Communications exec vp programming acquisition, says of the deals: “In recent years, video packages have become increasingly inflexible, forcing customers to pay for programming they don’t want or can’t afford as top content moves to streaming apps. This shift in the ecosystem, combined with changing consumer preferences, highlighted the need for a new approach to the video distribution model that prioritizes customer choice and value.”

12: Another Sign of China’s Retreat From Hollywood

When conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group, owned by China’s one-time richest man Wang Jianlin, acquired Legendary Entertainment for $3.5 billion back in 2016, it signaled the high watermark of a surge in cross-border business activity between Hollywood and Beijing’s then-booming entertainment sector. That era officially came to a close in October as Legendary and private equity firm Apollo bought out Wanda’s remaining stake in the studio for an undisclosed sum.

“When Wanda reached out to us earlier this year with capital needs we were presented with a unique opportunity to purchase Wanda’s equity in Legendary at an attractive valuation and still maintain a substantial liquidity cushion to fund our growth plan,” says Legendary CEO Josh Grode, an attorney who worked on the deal directly himself. The buyout comes amid a banner year for the company, with two of its films, Dune: Part Two and Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire, earning nearly $1.3 billion at the global box office. Having a strategic partner in the China market was once considered essential for any major Hollywood player, but as Legendary embarks on its next chapter, the company’s shifting priorities reveal just how much the landscape has changed. Adds Grode: “As we enter a phase of our strategic growth plan that may include some M&A, removing a foreign entity as a key shareholder reduces transaction-related risks.”

More Dealmakers: Alan Wang, Zheng (Jonathan) Zhou and Oliver Board of Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer (for Wanda); Andrew J. Nussbaum and Zachary S. Podolsky of Wachtell Lipton (for Apollo)

13: The Blockbuster Podcast Deals of the Year

While the podcast wars have died down, a few names are still paying big for top-charting shows that executives believe could help grow their podcasting advertising businesses by bringing in fresh talent and new subscribers. SiriusXM also has an eye to eventually stash one of the big podcasts behind a paywall, while the Amazon-owned Wondery, helmed by CEO Sargent, hopes to use its new talent to bridge into video, live events and more. “We just won’t make stupid deals,” says SiriusXM president and chief content officer Greenstein. “And we won’t make deals that don’t make sense. It doesn’t mean some aren’t a gamble.”

14: TPG Muscles Back Into Representation

In September 2023, TPG exited its stake in major agency CAA with a blockbuster $7 billion sale to mogul François-Henri Pinault. But it didn’t take long for the private equity giant to make its next foray into Hollywood. In June, TPG invested in management firm Untitled, then months later orchestrated a merger with literary management outfit Grandview under the banner of a parent company called Initial Group, with Pratte at the helm, and with plans to expand. Jacqui Hawwa, a business unit partner at TPG who worked on the deals, adds, “We see a significant opportunity to scale the company and ultimately build across multiple complementary talent verticals with subsequent investments.”

More Dealmakers: Justin Hamill and Rick Offsay of Latham & Watkins (for TPG)

15: The Studio That Took the AI Deal First

Having seen Runway’s tools at work in Everything Everywhere All at Once, Lionsgate was bullish the tech could be leveraged to cut costs at several parts of the production pipeline. And by saving money that would’ve gone to splashy explosions, which could make the difference in whether a production is greenlit, it figures AI will overall be beneficial for Hollywood. “It’s the Wild West,” says Burns, vice chair of Lionsgate. “We’re trying to stay ahead of the curve and figure out where the puck is going as opposed to where it’s been.” Writers are paying attention. Dialogue from 53,000 movies and 85,000 TV series has already been scraped — everything from The Godfather to all episodes of Breaking Bad — for AI training sets that Apple, Meta and more tech giants have been using, per a data analysis by The Atlantic on Nov. 18.

© 2024 The Hollywood Reporter.