Innholdsfortegnelse for 03/27/2024 i Variety

Our cover story this week boldly probes the present state of “Star Trek,” the mother of all sci-fi dynasties — the durable property that changed the way Hollywood thinks about content franchises. Adam B. Vary, senior entertainment writer and our genre expert nonpareil, has spent months reporting on Para-mount Global’s plans for keeping the “Star Trek” brand strong as its 60th anniversary approaches in a few years. “‘Star Trek’ is an institution,” says Alex Kurtzman, who is the ultimate captain of the enterprise owned by Paramount Global. And like all institutions, the fictional world crafted two generations ago by creator Gene Roddenberry periodically needs reinvention. This is one of those moments, as Vary’s reporting underscores. Even as the brand is being stocked with new TV series, the film side of…

Will Shari have to break up the band? Or is a comeback on the horizon for Paramount Global? More than four years after Shari Redstone won the battle to merge Viacom and CBS, the entertainment mogul is at a crossroads in the M&A soap opera that threatens to envelop her beloved but beleaguered media empire. Redstone, non-executive chair of Paramount Global and its controlling shareholder, is understood to have been unimpressed by the recent $11 billion offer for the Paramount Pictures film studio from Apollo Global Management and Legendary Entertainment. Team Redstone is known to be in discussions with David Ellison’s Skydance Media on a partnership that would ultimately bring together Paramount Global, Skydance and Redstone’s National Amusements Inc. holding company in what has been described as a complicated two-step…

Is there such a thing as too much Judge Judy? Local TV station owners are about to find out. CBS-owned court show “Judge Judy,” fronted by the inimitable Judge Judith Sheindlin, was a stalwart of daytime syndication for 25 years until it ended original production in fall 2021. But “Judge Judy” never left the airwaves because CBS has continued to sell rerun packages of the show to station owners. “Judge Judy” racked up more than 7,200 half-hour episodes over its long run. But Sheindlin didn’t hang up her robe after she left “Judge Judy”’s courtroom. She immediately moved on to a new court show, “Judy Justice,” that bowed in 2021 on Amazon’s Freevee streamer. Now, Sox Entertainment, the distributor of “Judy Justice,” is selling reruns of that show to local…

“I can’t beIieve I get to pIay the captain of the Enterprise.” Anson Mount is sitting across from me on one of the Toronto soundstages for the Paramount+ series “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds,” which is set in the years when his character, Capt. Christopher Pike, led the legendary Federation starship with a young Spock and Uhura. We’re speaking on the sleek Enterprise bridge, and Mount is recounting the out-of-body experience he had the first time he sat in the iconic captain’s chair. “I had this immediate flashback to playing ‘Star Trek’ as a kid,” he says. “I don’t think a day goes by where I don’t at some point stop and think to myself, ‘I’m on fucking “Star Trek.”’” “Strange New Worlds” is the 12th “Star Trek” TV show since…

Ahead of Milan Fashion Week 2024’s unveiling of the high-end line Maison Yoshiki, its designer and namesake, Japanese rock star Yoshiki, made a last-minute decision to perform on the runway. About 10 minutes into the Feb. 22 presentation at the city’s museum of science and technology dedicated to Leonardo da Vinci, the throbbing, industrial EDM production subsided when Yoshiki sat down at his personally branded Kawai crystal piano, placed between two lanes of runway models. A melodic solo accompaniment of Bach’s Prelude in C Major soundtracked the parade of minimal, primarily black satin, silk and faux fur trimmed pieces. As all 37 models returned to the stage for the final look, Yoshiki performed his arrangement of “Nessun dorma” from Puccini’s “Turandot,” followed by the designer of the hour stepping away…

For many in show business, it’s always been the cost of doing business. “It” being the cash one must pony up to court talent, stimulate new enterprise and keep up the appearance of lush prosperity in a town obsessed with who has what. That issue was partly at the heart of a messy public split in mid-March between United Talent Agency and Michael Kassan, the CEO of consultancy firm MediaLink, which UTA acquired in 2021 for $125 million. In arbitration documents, Kassan says the agency and CEO Jeremy Zimmer tapped him to run a top-shelf client services business, then stripped him of authority and flagrantly ignored contractual stipulations — which included a $1.5 million discretionary fund earmarked for gifts and perks like private air travel. In its own lawsuit against…

When NBC recently resurrected its long-dormant “Deal or No Deal,” it came with a new format: “Deal or No Deal Island.” The game show was originally a “shiny floor” in-studio contest where players had to guess how much money was inside a large briefcase. The updated iteration takes things outdoors, raising the stakes by adding interpersonal dynamics, physical challenges and survival to the mix. At producer Endemol Shine North America, they call adding a fresh spin to existing IP the “ESNA twist.” And it’s become a hallmark for CEO Sharon Levy, who took over the shingle — part of Banijay Americas — a little more than a year ago. “I’m not a fan of a straight-up reboot without a reason for being,” Levy says. “As much as I love making…

Mother’s Day weekend 2019 marked a turning point in the young life of Madhuri Shekar. It all started two years before with a phone call from a woman named Kate Navin, then head of theater for Audible. Navin said she’d recently been armed with money to develop original works from emerging playwrights, and she was calling to offer Shekar, just a year out of Juilliard, the chance to write. The only catch: Shekar’s play would have to be crafted as an audio-only production. Shekar’s answer to this challenge was “Evil Eye,” a 100-minute potboiler that revolves around daily telephone conversations between a mother in India and a daughter in Los Angeles. The finished play was released on Audible in May 2019. For Shekar, the impact on her career was immediate.…

As with his long music career, Yoshiki’s eventual foray into fashion seemed inevitable. “I’m the oldest son, and, usually, the son takes over the family business,” Yoshiki says about the expectations for him to take over his parents’ kimono shop. “I was always surrounded by those flashy kimonos. I knew every single process because my father had a kind of factory behind the store.” He continues: “I became a musician, but fashion’s always been around — music and fashion are almost inseparable.” The multihyphenate is playing in the major leagues with his Maison Yoshiki Paris brand, which recently launched at Milan’s Fashion Week. Yoshiki says he is overwhelmed by the “great response” to the line and his show. The fashion connection was always there. In the early 1980s, with X…

On Oct. 7, when the Israel-Hamas war broke out, Palestinian director Annemarie Jacir was just one week away from starting principal photography in Bethlehem, 45 miles from Gaza, on “All Before You.” The Oscar-nominated filmmaker’s long-gestating project reconstructs the 1936 farmer-led revolt against British colonial rule and the influx of Jewish settlements in Palestine that has been at the root of the conflict. The latest outbreak of violence came after a Hamas-led terror attack that left about 1,200 Israelis dead while 250 were taken hostage, with more than 100 believed to still be held by Hamas. Now Jacir, who is based in Ramallah, the de facto capital of the Palestinian Authority, is anxiously waiting for a cease-fire that will put an end to the death and destruction and allow her…

Yoshiki’s involvement in philanthropy encompasses a diverse range of causes, with his family and upbringing being core influences. “I lost my father when I was young,” Yoshiki says. “He actually took his own life. I was 10 years old, and since then, I have always wondered, why do people live? The reason I do charitable work is because I want to give it back.” Since the 1990s, Yoshiki has given his talent and money to philanthropic projects. One of Yoshiki’s earliest moments of giving came in response to the 1995 Japan earthquake that claimed more than 6,000 lives; he staged a benefit concert with X Japan, and presented new pianos to students whose schools were damaged. In the years since, Yoshiki has helped provide relief, aid and donations for other…

Civil War Director Alex Garland Screenwriter Alex Garland Cast Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, Cailee Spaeny, Stephen McKinley Henderson Distributor A24 The press are the good guys, but also kind of the bad guys, in Alex Garland’s virtuosic “Civil War,” a jarring ground-level account of what a near-future disunification of the United States might look like. Intended as a wake-up call, the long-fuse thriller — which starts slow and snow-balls to a jaw-dropping raid on Washington, D.C. — embeds viewers alongside a dedicated team of journalists making their way to the Capitol while the country unravels around them. It’s the most upsetting dystopian vision yet from the sci-fi brain that killed off all of London for the zombie uprising depicted in “28 Days Later,” and one that can’t be easily consumed…

Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show Platform HBO Premiere date March 29 Episodes 8 Creators Jerrod Carmichael, Ari Katcher, Eli Despres Cast Jerrod Carmichael Stand-up comedy is a public performance that simulates intimate spontaneity. This is equally true of reality television, so it’s natural that a master at the former might try his hand at the latter. Hence “Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show,” a self-reflexive (and self-explanatory) HBO project that follows Carmichael’s Emmy-winning special “Rothaniel” with a more extended look the comic’s later-in-life coming out. Just don’t call it unfiltered. “This is not truth,” a friend reminds Carmichael and by extension, us. “This is narrative.” “Jerrod Carmichael Reality Show” is not the first time a professional jokester has blurred the line between entertainment and actual life. Carmichael brings up “The Truman Show”; more…