Reese Witherspoon
Hello Sunshine, the media company founded by Reese Witherspoon, has been sold to a new media company led by former Walt Disney Company executives Tom Staggs and Kevin Mayer.
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The deal, which is backed by private equity giant Blackstone, values Hello Sunshine at $900 million.
Hello Sunshine is owned by Witherspoon, her husband and former CAA agent Jim Toth and Seth Rodsky, as well as investors AT&T and Laurene Powell Jobs’ Emerson Collective. Witherspoon and CEO Sarah Harden will continue to run the company and remain equity holders. They will also join the board of the new media company.
The company has previously produced HBO’s Big Little Lies, Apple TV+’s The Morning Show and Hulu’s Little Fires Everywhere, all of which also star Witherspoon. The Wall Street Journalfirst reported the sale.
Hello Sunshine’s sale comes on the heels of other major acquisitions — including Amazon’s purchase of MGM and Discovery’s takeover of WarnerMedia — as companies fight to compete in an increasingly crowded streaming market.
Video: Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine to Sell for $900 Million to Kevin Mayer and Tom Staggs’s New Media Company (TheWrap)
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Prentice Penny Moves Overall Deal From HBO to Disney’s Onyx Collective
Prentice Penny has exited his overall deal at HBO and signed a new multiyear pact with Disney General Entertainment’s Onyx Collective, the studio said Monday. Per Onyx Collective, “Under the terms of the agreement, Penny will produce, write and direct new projects through his production company, A Penny For Your Thoughts Entertainment, across all Disney platforms, including Hulu, which serves as the primary home for Onyx Collective titles.” Penny and A Penny For Your Thoughts Entertainment will have the ability to develop projects that he would produce, write and/or direct himself, as well as develop and supervise projects from other writers, according to the “Insecure” showrunner’s new home studio. A Penny For Your Thoughts Entertainment President and Partner, Chris Pollack, will continue in his role, leading the company alongside Penny under the new deal. The company’s development team, led by Alex Soler, will also make the move, continuing in their respective roles. Along with “Insecure,” Penny is known for his work on HBO’s “Pause with Sam Jay,” Netflix’s original film “Uncorked,” as well as comedies “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” “Happy Endings,” “Scrubs” and “Girlfriends.” “When we mapped out our strategy and ideal partners for Onyx Collective, Prentice Penny was at the top of the vision board,” Tara Duncan, president of Freeform and Onyx Collective, said in a statement Monday. “Prentice has a depth of experience telling wildly entertaining, culturally specific stories. His prolific ambitions, both as a writer and director, and his unique ability to identify trends make him the perfect creator to help build our brand. I’m honored he chose Onyx Collective to be his creative home.” “I could not be more excited to partner with Onyx Collective for the next phase of my career. The second I sat down with Dana and Tara I knew I wanted to work with them and make this my new home. To be at the ground floor of what Tara and the entire Onyx Collective team wants to be is an honor,” Penny added. “The types of projects that Onyx, Chris (Pollack), and my fantastic team want to make line up perfectly. We are also ecstatic that we can continue to foster and develop more one of a kind artists under this deal. As a writer/director/producer you always want to have as many tools at your disposal to create your art and all of the various platforms under the Disney brand just made for a beautiful marriage.” Penny is repped by WME, Theresa Kang-Lowe’s Blue Marble Management and attorneys John Meigs and Adam Kaller. Read original story Prentice Penny Moves Overall Deal From HBO to Disney’s Onyx Collective At TheWrap
TheWrap
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‘Lord of the Rings’ Series Sets Fall 2022 Premiere Date at Amazon – Here’s Your First Look (Photo)
Amazon’s “The Lord of the Rings” TV series has finally received a premiere date from the streaming service. And though it’s more than a year away, fans now at least know the one date to rule them all. The yet-to-be titled big-budget show will debut Friday, Sept. 2, 2022, on Prime Video, with new episodes rolling out weekly after the initial launch. As if that wasn’t enough “LOTR” content from Amazon for the day, the studio also released the first-look image from the show, which you can see below. This photo is from the series premiere episode, TheWrap has learned, though Amazon is keeping the identify of the character and the actor in the image under wraps at this time. The announcement of the premiere date for “The Lord of the Rings” Season 1 and reveal of the first-look image comes just as filming on the episodes was completed in New Zealand, with the second season’s production soon to begin. Per Amazon’s official description for the show: “The new epic drama brings to screens for the very first time J.R.R. Tolkien’s fabled Second Age of Middle-earth’s history. Beginning in a time of relative peace, thousands of years before the events of J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘The Hobbit’ and ‘The Lord of the Rings’ books, the series follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to Middle-earth.” Amazon’s “The Lord of the Rings” TV series stars Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Robert Aramayo, Owain Arthur, Maxim Baldry, Nazanin Boniadi, Morfydd Clark, Ismael Cruz Córdova, Charles Edwards, Trystan Gravelle, Sir Lenny Henry, Ema Horvath, Markella Kavenagh, Joseph Mawle, Tyroe Muhafidin, Sophia Nomvete, Lloyd Owen, Megan Richards, Dylan Smith, Charlie Vickers, Leon Wadham, Benjamin Walker, Daniel Weyman and Sara Zwangobani. The fantasy epic is led by showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay, who executive produce alongside Lindsey Weber, Callum Greene, J.A. Bayona, Belén Atienza, Justin Doble, Jason Cahill, Gennifer Hutchison, Bruce Richmond and Sharon Tal Yguado. Wayne Che Yip is co-executive producer, Charlotte Brändström directs, and Christopher Newman is a producer. “The journey begins September 2, 2022, with the premiere of our original ‘The Lord of the Rings’ series on Prime Video,” Jennifer Salke, head of Amazon Studios, said Monday. “I can’t express enough just how excited we all are to take our global audience on a new and epic journey through Middle-earth! Our talented producers, cast, creative, and production teams have worked tirelessly in New Zealand to bring this untold and awe-inspiring vision to life.” “As Bilbo says, ‘Now I think I am quite ready to go on another journey.’ Living and breathing Middle-earth these many months has been the adventure of a lifetime. We cannot wait for fans to have the chance to do so as well,” Payne and McKay added in a joint statement. Courtesy of Amazon Studios Read original story ‘Lord of the Rings’ Series Sets Fall 2022 Premiere Date at Amazon – Here’s Your First Look (Photo) At TheWrap
TheWrap
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‘The View’: Mary Trump Calls Out Meghan McCain’s Lack of ‘Courage’ for Sitting Out Her Segment
Meghan McCain, who will be moving on from “The View” on Friday, was absent from the show’s highly anticipated interview with the former president’s niece, Mary Trump, who came on promoting her latest book, “The Reckoning.” After much discussion on Donald Trump and his followers’ reactions to the Jan. 6 insurrection, the author went on to state that her uncle deserves the backlash and blame he’s receiving for “the necessary deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans” due to his failure to properly respond to the coronavirus. “One thing Donald proved is that using racism as a platform was successful, and I think that’s why we see so much strife in this country,” she said. “And we need to continue having the kinds of conversations about race and gender that you have.” At the very end of her interview, Trump finished by pointing out McCain’s noticeable absence, saying that the commentator did not have the “courage” to talk to her. “It’s a shame that your colleague didn’t have the courage to come on and have this conversation with me,” Mary Trump continued, referring to McCain. “But I appreciate that you were all willing to take up these very difficult subjects because racism, in my view, is at the heart of everything that’s wrong in 21st century America.” The co-hosts sat in awkward silence before Whoopi Goldberg concluded the segment and plugged Trump’s book. This came after the first half of the show, which was spent talking about Kathy Griffin and her lung cancer diagnosis announcement. During the segment, McCain made clear that despite her sorrow for Griffin and hopes for her “speedy recovery,” she dislikes the comedian for the homophobic comments she made about Clay Aiken’s sexuality. “My issue with Kathy Griffin is, I’m going to name drop Clay Aiken as one of my closest friends in the entire world, he’s [like] my brother. She made very, very, very cruel and homophobic jokes about him before he was out of the closet,” McCain said on Monday’s episode of the talk show. “We have to go back to like 2002, 2003, when that was still acceptable. She went on to demand an apology from Griffin on Aiken’s behalf, saying that he could’ve become an opioid addict, with the “degree of bullying that happened to him.” “You can just go on YouTube and see a lot of the jokes that she made about him — and other comedians, but she really led it — so I would love to hear an apology, if she’s doing this kind of soul searching, for what could’ve happened with my good friend. I don’t like her, I’m never gonna like her for all the jokes she made about Clay.” You can watch a clip of Trump’s interview here or above. Read original story ‘The View’: Mary Trump Calls Out Meghan McCain’s Lack of ‘Courage’ for Sitting Out Her Segment At TheWrap
TheWrap
UP NEXT
Staggs and Mayer have been seeking a number of deals in recent months for their still-unnamed media company. Blackstone has backed the company with a war chest of at least $2 billion, with the firm’s head of private equity Joe Baratta saying in a statement Monday that “the rapidly growing demand for high-quality content is one of our firm’s highest-conviction investment themes.”
Staggs and Mayer said in a statement that “Hello Sunshine is a perfect fit for our vision of a new, next generation entertainment, technology, and commerce company.”
“We seek to empower creators with innovation, capital, and scale to inspire, entertain, and delight global audiences with engaging content, experiences, and products,” they added. “Our platform will foster a uniquely creator-friendly culture that gives elite talent the resources they need to create and capitalize on their best, most inventive work. We look forward to backing Reese, Sarah, and their world-class team as they continue to produce and identify dynamic, engaging content for years to come.”
In February THR reported that the firm was looking to roll up Scooter Braun’s Ithaca Holdings and Ben Silverman’s Propagate Content. Ultimately Ithaca Holdings sold to South Korea’s HYBE group.
In a statement, Witherspoon said the deal “will enable us to tell even more entertaining, impactful and illuminating stories about women’s lives globally. I couldn’t be more excited about what this means for our future. I am committed to continuing to create opportunity for filmmakers, authors and creators of all backgrounds and experiences to tell their stories in their own way, and to reach more audiences who will see that their stories matter.”
Mayer has been busy since stepping down as TikTok CEO last August. He and Staggs partnered on a Special Purpose Acquisition Company with Shaquille O’Neal (it subsequently took The Beachbody Company public, with Mayer joining the board), and Mayer also became chairman of the sports streaming service DAZN.
