Execs around the world look to Hollywood as reports of top team for newly renamed Skydance emerge
With Paramount’s $111bn acquisition of Warner Bros Discovery set to complete on Tuesday, details around how the giant organisation might look - and who might run it - are beginning to emerge.
David Ellison - previously chief exec at Paramount - revealed on Friday that the combined entity including WBD would be known as Skydance once the takeover is completed, adding that the move allows Warner Bros and Paramount to “remain in the spotlight”.
“What once was the peak, is now just the beginning,” Ellison posted, and the names of those being tasked with taking the US studio juggernaut to new heights are becoming clearer.
Who’s running what?
Ellison moved quickly to bring in additional firepower to the C-suite after gaining approval for his deal with 12 US states looking to delay the merger - a deal that means there will be remarkably little structural change required at newly rebranded Skydance.
Minutes after the deal was given the nod last week, the Paramount chief exec announced former Mattel chief Ynon Kreiz as co-CEO of the combined company, effective from today.
While that move had not been widely foreseen, arguably the biggest question around the senior management team - at least from a TV and streaming point of view - appears to have already been settled with the exit of Paramount’s Cindy Holland.
The veteran Netflix exec departed late last month having overseen the US studio’s DTC offering since last year when Paramount merged with Skydance. Her exit seemingly paves the way for HBO veteran Casey Bloys to take the top streaming job.
Just what he will oversee remains to be confirmed: rumours abound over how Ellison and Skydance will approach combining HBO Max and Paramount+, with some suggesting the streamers could remain separate entities but bundled together.
One of those was Ellison himself, who was asked last week what would happen to the streamers. He declined to comment on the situtation, aside from pointedly highlighting the “very succesful” bundling of HBO Max and Disney+ in the US. He added that a move such as that would make “a lot of sense”.
While Skydance might be thinking about keeping its streamers separate, at least to some degree, integration appears to be underway on the senior exec side of the operation.
One senior exec being lined up for a bigger role is Paramount’s TV chairman George Cheeks, according to US trade Deadline. He already oversees Star Trek and Fire Country unit CBS Studios, which also has a division in the UK, but his remit is set to expand further to include The Pitt and Ted Lasso producer Warner Bros TV, as well as Reacher outfit Paramount Television Studios.
The latter is also behind London-set MobLand but has become best known recently for its work on Taylor Sheridan franchises, with shows ranging from Lioness to Yellowstone spin-off Dutton Ranch (Sheridan departs the studio in 2029 for NBC Universal.)
CBS Studios president David Stapf is set to report into Cheeks, as will Paramount TV Studios topper Matt Thunell and Warner Bros TV Group’s chairman Channing Dungey, who also oversees US Networks for WBD.
Dungey is reportedly set to continue overseeing WBD cable brands such as Discovery Channel and Food Network, but will also add Paramount cable networks such as MTV and Nickelodeon to her remit. The networks had previously fallen under Cheeks, to whom she is now set to report.
Further details of exec changes are expected this week, although there will be no immediate reshuffle at WBD’s DC Studios, which remains under the stewardship of James Gunn and Peter Safran.
Their remit includes oversight of film and TV productions, and they are set to report into Josh Greenstein and Dana Goldberg, according to numerous US reports.
Greenstein and Goldberg were lined up to oversee movies under the Paramount and Warner Bros banners respectively, according to reports.
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