Category: 5. Entertainment

Mohit Suri’s romantic drama Saiyaara has completed its first week at the box office with stellar numbers, closing in at an impressive Rs 155.24 crore net in India till 1 PM. Powered by fresh talent, soulful music, and a wide release, the film has exceeded expectations and established itself as a blockbuster within just seven days.Saiyaara Movie ReviewThe film opened with a strong Rs 21.5 crore on Friday, marking one of the highest debuts ever for a film led by newcomers. Word of mouth and positive audience feedback helped Saiyaara witness a significant surge on Saturday with Rs 26 crore, and a spectacular Sunday followed with Rs 35.75 crore—its biggest single-day figure yet.Unlike many films that drop steeply on Monday, Saiyaara held its ground remarkably well and earned more than its first day, collecting Rs 24 crore. In fact, its Tuesday collection saw a slight upward tick at Rs 25 crore, thanks to steady footfall in urban centres and strong youth connect. By midweek, the momentum slowed slightly but remained healthy, as Wednesday brought in Rs 21 crore (rough estimate).The film for the first six days have earned more than Rs 20 crore on each day- a rare feat for films in post-pandemic era. On its seventh day—Thursday—Saiyaara had already raked in Rs4.46 crore by 2 PM, suggesting a potential final day figure of around Rs 12-15 crore by day end, making it the lowest day for the film in the entire week. But with the weekend kicking in from tomorrow , one can expect major upswing and thereby film possibly crossing Rs 200 crore mark.What makes Saiyaara’s performance even more noteworthy is that it achieved this without the pull of an established superstar. The lead pair—Ahaan Panday and Aneet Padda—have struck a chord with younger audiences, while Mohit Suri’s signature blend of intense romance and chartbuster music has worked wonders at the box office.With a total of Rs 155.24 crore in just 7 days, Saiyaara now stands among the biggest first-week grossers for a film headlined by debutants. It has surpassed industry benchmarks set by films like Student of the Year and Heropanti in their opening weeks, and the road ahead looks promising.

Benedict Cumberbatch has recently expressed his elation for receiving Golden Eye Award at this year’s Zurich Film Festival.

In a press statement shared via Deadline, the Doctor Strange actor feels “honoured” to be invited to The Zurich Film Festival to receive The Golden Eye Award.

Benedict noted that this festival is “important in recognising, encouraging and supporting all movie-makers across the world, with emphasis on inspiring new talent and voices, something close to my heart”.

“I am delighted to be accepting this special award,” said the 49-year-old.

It is pertinent to mention that Sherlock actor will receive the award on September 29 and he will also give a masterclass for the Zurich audience.

In another statement, Christian Jungen, Festival Director of the Zurich Film Festival, praised the actor, saying he is “one of the most versatile character actors of his generation”.

“He comes from the theatre, masters his craft in every role, and gives his characters emotional depth – whether as Alan Turing in The Imitation Game or as superhero Doctor Strange in the Marvel universe,” pointed out Christian.

“We have shown many of his films at the ZFF in recent years and are delighted to be able to welcome him to Zurich in person for the first time, both as an actor and as the producer of The Thing With Feathers,” added the festival director.

For the unversed, Benedict has worked with seasoned movie-makers throughout his career.

They included Jane Campion, Joe Wright, Steve McQueen, and Wes Anderson.

However, In his latest movie, The Thing With Feathers, Benedict is directed by Dylan Southern.

Meanwhile, Zurich Film Festival will run from September 25 to October 5.

Amelia Gray returns in chapter two of her campaign with PUMA, stepping into the spotlight with the Mostro, a silhouette built to disrupt, made to stand out, and ready for wherever the evening leads. Showing the hybrid silhouette’s versatility through her own style, Gray ventures out into the dazzling lights of the night, making the dance floor her own runway as the flashing lights and pulsing music amplify the Mostro’s boundary-pushing spirit.

Partnership offers fans new ways to experience the iconic Super Hero’s release on the big screen through digital and in-person activations

 

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. announced a global partnership with Warner Bros. and DC Studios to celebrate the latest “Superman” film with a series of fan activations, Superman-themed video content and limited-edition digital artworks from DC Comics via Samsung Art Store.

 

“Samsung is committed to creating a richer and more meaningful entertainment experience,” said Hun Lee, Executive Vice President of the Visual Display Business at Samsung Electronics. “Through collaborations with leading creative studios and artists, we continue to help people engage more deeply with the stories and character they love, whether in the theater or at home.”

 

“Superman,” the first film in DC Studios’ new cinematic universe, written, directed and produced by James Gunn, hits theaters worldwide starting July 9. To mark the release, Samsung is launching a global campaign with the tagline “It’s not just big. It’s super big,” spotlighting a range of campaign video content celebrating the original Super Hero and bringing the excitement of the film to audiences across digital platforms, retail locations and public spaces.

 

In London, the campaign will come to life through a series of Daily Planet-themed newsstand kiosks, appearing at high-traffic locations such as The Shard and Kings Cross Station.

 

Fans can also pick up limited-edition Superman-themed items, receive exclusive gifts and take part in a global social media challenge by sharing their event photos or videos for a chance to win super prizes, including a 98” Samsung TV.

 

Interactive activations will appear at major malls across Asia — including Malaysia, Vietnam and Korea — where fans can explore Superman-themed photo booths, immersive pop-up displays and hands-on product experiences.

 

 

Additionally, Samsung Art Store, the leading digital art platform on Samsung Art TVs, is featuring a limited-time 10-piece Superman digital art collection from DC Comics free to users from July 1 through August 31. Available on The Frame as well as 2025 QLED and Neo QLED models[1], the collection brings Superman’s heroic legacy into the home and gives fans a whole new way to enjoy Superman-inspired art.

 

Samsung’s Super Big TV lineup includes 98” 100” 115” Class options across Neo QLED and Crystal UHD models.[2] With expansive screens, stunning picture quality and AI-powered enhancements that deliver smoother images and deeper contrast, Samsung aims to deliver a grander home entertainment experience.

 

For more information, visit www.samsung.com.my.

 

 

 

About Superman

DC Studios presents a Troll Court Entertainment/The Safran Company Production, A James Gunn Film, Superman, which will be in theaters and IMAX^® July 9 2025, distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures.

 

 

 

[1] Samsung Art TV includes MICRO LED, The Frame, The Frame Pro, Neo QLED 8K, Neo QLED and QLED models starting from Q7F and above.

[2] Product availability vary by region.

I’ve been told by multiple people that the set of a short drama doesn’t necessarily look that different from an indie movie or commercial shoot, except everything is churned out much faster to save on costs. Whereas a traditional shoot would last weeks or months, the entire season of a vertical show is typically filmed within two weeks.

Nicole Mattox, one of the vertical stars working with ReelShort in Los Angeles, told me she usually books two to three shoots in one month, with only two days in between. A professionally trained actress originally from Texas, she had only been in a few small movie productions before stumbling on the short drama industry in 2023. But she says she quickly learned how to remember all of her lines—an impressive feat, considering that the platforms usually shoot a dozen pages of script a day, whereas a traditional movie may only shoot three.

Mattox says her acting coach told her that her performances don’t have to be unrealistically dramatic; rather, it’s just that every plot development is incredibly meaningful for her characters. For example, in the fictional world of a vertical drama, a romantic breakup can be your entire life. “There’s nothing else for you to move on from. There’s no future for you anymore. Everything’s ruined,” Mattox explains.

Creating Global Stars

Hao, who works in talent recruiting for ReelShort, says many of the company’s actors come from modeling or advertising backgrounds and have never had speaking roles before. Now, they can star in a dozen shows in a single year and quickly grow their careers.

The third ReelShort production Mattox starred in was a romantic comedy about professional ice hockey called Breaking the Ice. Mattox played the personal assistant to an NHL player, who naturally, was also his secret baby mama. The show became a runaway success, with over 300 million views on ReelShort.

Mattox says she has been surprised by how devoted her fans are, a large number of whom are in the Philippines. In May, some of them paid to put a picture of her face on a billboard in Times Square to celebrate her birthday. Earlier this month, they rented another billboard in Manila to advertise her latest production. Your show “had me in a chokehold,” one commenter wrote on her personal TikTok account, where she has amassed over 130,000 followers.

What ReelShort did after Breaking the Ice became a hit demonstrates the real secret behind its success. The company quickly adapted it for the Spanish-speaking and Japanese-speaking markets, but rather than dubbing the existing dialog or simply swapping the actors, it changed key aspects of the plot. In the Spanish version, the male protagonist became a soccer player, while in the Japanese version, he was a baseball star. The original series debuted in July 2024; the locally filmed adaptations dropped in September and December the same year.

In Hollywood, that kind of speed is unfathomable. Four years after the Korean Netflix show Squid Game became a global sensation, the American adaptation is still only rumored to be in the works. The short drama industry can move much faster not only because its production costs are low, but because startups like ReelShort have mastered the art of localization—after all, they first had to export the genre from China. While Sensor Tower says US audiences still represent about 49 percent of the global revenues, half of downloads of short drama apps this year have come from Latin America and Southeast Asia. That explains why ReelShort produced its hit English show The Double Life of My Billionaire Husband in five other languages, and why it has started working with legacy telenovela production companies in Colombia.

Chinese Roots

ReelShort’s parent company, Crazy Maple Studio, was previously majority-controlled by COL Group, one of the largest digital novel publishers in China. The startup now says its founder, Joey Jia, owns the company, though COL Group continues to hold 49 percent of shares. Even as the genre goes global, most of the people making short dramas in the US still appear to be Chinese immigrants or Chinese Americans, largely because they are more familiar with how it works.

Jay, a Los Angeles–based short-drama producer from China, says the industry still looks to China for guidance and inspiration. One of the key lessons it learned from China is the importance of collecting extremely granular user data. Which episode made people stop watching a show? Which one made them sign up for a subscription?

Something strange happened to Hayden Anhedönia in January. The 27-year-old artist known professionally as Ethel Cain was finishing off her upcoming album Willoughby Tucker, I’ll Always Love You when she had to go to court. “I got into some traffic trouble,” she says coyly in her soft southern lilt. The plan was to drive from the courthouse in her home city of Tallahassee, Florida, to Toronto to wrap the album with her longtime collaborator Matthew Tomasi.

“Listen,” she continues, leaning forward into her webcam – a glint behind the eyes, conspiratorial tone in the voice. “I don’t know what happened in that courthouse, but I walked out of there having been put on probation. I couldn’t go to Canada. I couldn’t go anywhere.” As a result, Tomasi flew down to Tallahassee. They holed up in Anhedönia’s tiny home studio and didn’t leave until it was done. When they weren’t working, they watched Twin Peaks for the first time.

“Every day it was wake up, work, Twin Peaks, work, Twin Peaks, work …” They binged the whole thing in two weeks. Anhedönia even hunted down the synths that composer Angelo Badalamenti used on the soundtrack and sprinkled them on a few of her own tracks. One night they finished working, watched the final episode, and went to bed. She woke up to the news that David Lynch had passed away.

“I was really happy that I finished the show while he was still alive,” she says. The synths “felt kind of like an homage. A way to keep David and Angelo and Laura [Palmer] alive in some small way.”

Lynch’s work stages epic battles between darkness and light, pitting the purity of the individual against the corruption of the world; small-town life versus primordial forces of evil. The same battle plays out on Willoughby Tucker, which tells the story of what Anhedönia describes as “a deeply traumatised love story between two kids who are in love, but the world weighs on them”. It’s also present in her debut album, 2022’s Preacher’s Daughter, a southern gothic tale of a teenage girl named Ethel Cain who flees the confines of her religious upbringing only to be murdered and cannibalised by her boyfriend.

The grisly subject matter made for unlikely breakthrough material, but Preacher’s Daughter ended up becoming one of 2022’s most critically lauded pop breakouts. In the space of a few months, Anhedönia jumped from collaborating with niche SoundCloud rappers to being featured in Forbes’ 30 Under 30 and fronting campaigns for Givenchy, Marc Jacobs and Miu Miu. When Preacher’s Daughter was rereleased on vinyl this April, it broke into the Top 10 in the UK, Australia, the Netherlands and the US, where Anhedönia made history as the first publicly trans musician to reach the Top 10 of the Billboard albums chart.

As far as ascents to fame go, Anhedönia’s was a baptism of fire. She has attracted the kind of invasive, obsessive fandom typically reserved for A-list pop stars. Owing to her sharp cultural commentary and eviscerating political takes – in a viral post after Trump’s election, she wrote “If you voted for Trump, I hope that peace never finds you” – her social media accounts are routinely trawled for “problematic” content, and her criticism of the US healthcare system has been discussed on Fox News. Speaking to the Guardian in July 2023, Anhedönia expressed a desire “to have a much smaller fanbase”.

“I’ve long struggled with my identity in pop,” she reasons now. “I love pop music, but my issue for a while was the way fandoms operate.” Having seen the violence and trauma of Preacher’s Daughter spun into flippant memes, she had feared that any future release would be similarly received. “I’ve since made my peace with that. At the end of the day, you make what you make and you put it out and people can do what they want with it.”

A recent firestorm over screenshots of things posted when she was 19, however, shows how merciless the spotlight can be. A slew of comments, including the use of racial slurs and rape jokes, were dug up from a “shameful” period during which she tried to be as “inflammatory and controversial as possible”, as she phrased it in a lengthy apology. “That was my account and those were my words”, she wrote, adding that she was now “truly sorry from the bottom of my heart”. But she hit back at further online speculation that she was “pedophile, a zoophile, or a porn-addicted incest fetishist”. She had been, she wrote, the target of a “transphobic/otherwise targeted smear campaign” that had also led to her personal accounts being hacked and family doxed and harrassed.

Anhedönia holds several positions that can be hard to reconcile. She’s a trans woman who grew up in the conservative southern Baptist community in the Florida panhandle, and still has a deep love affair with the area. She looks like one of the ethereal sisters from The Virgin Suicides, and talks like a girl next door refilling your coffee at a roadside diner, peppering her musings on existentialism and Eraserhead with homely expressions of geez and whatnot. She has experienced sexual trauma and assault, while her music often leans – in her words – “into sadomasochism” and “the taboo”.

Those nuances are often not acknowledged. “A lot of people don’t know how to interface with media that contains negativity or perversion or sexuality or immorality,” she says. “It’s not the first instinct to engage with these things critically – but when you see a bad character on screen, the movie shouldn’t hold your hand and say: Hey, that’s the bad guy. That’s your job.”

In January, Anhedönia released Perverts – an experimental departure from Preacher’s Daughter, let alone standard pop fare. Billed as a standalone project, the hour-and-a-half sprawl of ambient, drone and slowcore compositions roots around themes of shame, guilt and pleasure. There are no hooks, no choruses and barely any lyrics. Rather, its unsettling blend of industrial murmurs and desolate spoken word reflects Anhedönia’s experience of wandering “the Great Dark” – her term for a brief but “scary” winter when she was struggling to adjust to life after coming off tour.

Some listeners found it a challenging listen; others considered its references to madness and masturbation alienating. But it successfully reasserted the wide spectrum of Anhedönia’s music, which switches from soaring heartland pop-rock to sprawling abstract noise. “Now that the other end of the Ethel Cain spectrum has been established, I feel like I have a full range,” Anhedönia says.

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The second instalment of the Preacher’s trilogy, Willoughby Tucker serves as the prequel to Preacher’s Daughter, and has a similar structure – a pop-oriented first half full of youthful optimism, which plunges into slow burning instrumentals and thundering power ballads as the hammer of reality comes down. Beginning in the summer of 1986, it finds Ethel Cain as an insecure teenager “trying to navigate her first love in a broken world and a broken town”.

It wasn’t the plan to go back in time. Anhedönia intended to move forward, on to more “mature” things, but something kept nagging at her. “That Ethel’s entire story began with the love that she had for this boy … It felt like it needed telling. And come hell or high water, it was going to get told. It was practically seeping out of me.” Finishing the album was “honestly really sad, especially knowing where Preacher’s Daughter goes. Sometimes it’s hard for me to listen to. I tell myself it’s all fictional, but sometimes I’ll catch a lyric and it’ll resonate exactly with how I’m feeling. And I remember that it’s coming from me.”

Part of the difficulty in making Willoughby Tucker was the fact that Anhedönia had, at 27, recently entered into her first ever relationship. As she worked on this album, all her own 16-year-old anxieties came back. “Love was always my final frontier,” she says. “I never explored it. I never processed anything. I never progressed past the idea of love that I had as a teenager.” There were times when she was crying every day, begging for the album to be finished.

She’s glad of the process now. “I see Ethel Cain as a piece of me that I separate from myself and discard, so that I can make good decisions in life,” she says. “If Preacher’s Daughter was my learning experience of what not to do with trauma and healing, Willoughby Tucker has been my experience of what not to do in love.”

In the real world, bleak as it is, Anhedönia is determined to live well. Smiling between two long curtains of mousey brown hair, she reels off a list of reasons to get up in the morning: “A great breakfast, a beautiful sunrise, paying for someone’s groceries if they can’t.”

And then there is love – in her view the most “high-risk, high-reward” feeling in the world. A few days before we speak, she “hard launched” her new relationship, sharing a video of her new boyfriend lifting her up on a truck parked on a dirt road, and kissing her.

“Ethel Cain lived and died loving and praying to be loved back,” Anhedönia says. “The entire Preacher’s trilogy is centred around love. Love lost, love gained, love perverted, love stolen. Love is everything to us. It doesn’t matter what you love or who you love, but that you love something – and that love is what propels you forward every day. For better or worse, I think that is a beautiful thing.”

Willoughby Tucker, I’ll Always Love You is released on 8 August.

U.K. TV giant ITV, which recently struck a content deal with Walt Disney to share content between streaming services Disney+ and ITVX, reported first-half 2025 revenue on Thursday, including a 7 percent advertising revenue drop. That outperformed a bigger decline that had been forecast due to the benefit seen during the same period in 2024 from the men’s Euros soccer tournament, which drove substantial ad revenue. Second-quarter ad revenue fell 12 percent, also less than forecast by management.

Total advertising revenue was up 2 percent for the six-month period when compared to 2023, ITV, led by CEO Carolyn McCall, highlighted in its first-half financial update early in the morning London time.

ITV Studios posted a revenue increase of 3 percent for the first six months of 2025. The production arm, which has been a much-rumored takeover target for various possible bidders in the industry, had previously said that “we remain on track to deliver our target of total organic revenue growth of 5 percent on average per annum from 2021 to 2026 – ahead of the market,” but this year would be weighed more towards the second half of the year.

Overall, ITV on Thursday reported that first-half adjusted EBITA dropped 31 percent to £146 million ($198 million), while total revenue was down 1 percent to £1.85 billion ($2.51 billion).

“We are announcing an additional £15 million ($20 million) in permanent non-content cost savings, taking the total group permanent non-content savings in 2025 to £45 million ($61 million),” ITV also announced. “There will be a one-off cost of £40 million ($54 million) to achieve the total group savings. We expect our total content spend to be around £1.23 billion ($1.67 billion) in 2025, compared to the £1.25 billion ($1.70 billion) previously indicated, as we continue to optimize our content spend to best reflect viewer dynamics. While the economic environment remains uncertain, we now expect a better outturn for the full year 2025, driven by these cost efficiencies.”

On an earnings call, McCall called cost savings an ongoing focus. CFO Chris Kennedy mentioned technology and process efficiencies as drivers of the latest set of cost reductions. “Everyone is really focused on … rebalancing the cost base” to ensure continued business success.

“ITV is now a leaner, more digital business in a strong position to compete and succeed in a changing market,” McCall said. “We have the agility and capability to make the most of new revenue opportunities while driving profitable growth, strong cash generation and attractive returns to shareholders.”

She added: “ITV Studios continues to see positive momentum, with strong growth in external revenues in the first half, driven by content for the global streaming platforms, including The Devil’s Hour for Amazon Prime Video, and Run Away for Netflix.”

Total advertising revenue is expected to be “marginally down” in the third quarter, “compared to the same period in 2024, reflecting the tough comparative from the final knockout matches of the Men’s Euros in July 2024,” ITV said in a forecast. “Within this, we expect continued strong growth in digital advertising revenues.”

ITV continues to focus on growing a successful production business, McCall said earlier this year as she declined to comment on market chatter about a possible merger for ITV Studios. “We’ve got a really high-quality business. We already have scale, and we’re very diversified,” she said. “There’s been a lot of speculation, but I think you’d expect that speculation. There’s (also) speculation about Banijay and Fremantle, and there’s speculation about all studios businesses. We won’t comment on any speculation. All we would say is that we will continue to build the business as it has been built. We’ve grown even since 2018 by about 35 percent.”

Discussing industry consolidation, McCall said the consensus, whether in the U.S., the U.K. or Europe, continues to be that there will be more. “We are holding our own,” she concluded, though.

Asked about a potential deal on Thursday, McCall said, “We won’t comment on any speculation,” adding: “In this sector, everyone is talking to everyone.” Concluded the ITV CEO: “We are very focused on driving our strategy.”

During a Thursday call with reporters, McCall discussed the recent Disney streaming partnership. It will be billed as a “Taste of ITVX” and a “Taste of Disney+” on the companies’ respective platforms. The CEO called it a “pilot” and described it this way amid recent streaming bundling deals: “It is bundling, but it is much more promotional opportunity.” She also predicted that the deal would be “mutually beneficial,” saying it was not exclusive, meaning that similar agreements could also be struck with other companies.

Asked about AI, management said human resources, dubbing and other departments are using AI tools where available and where their use makes sense. AI is not about cutting jobs but “allowing people to do more upstream things,” the CEO said. Added Kennedy: “It’s a tool to augment … creativity, not replace everything. We really want our teams to experiment with AI tools in a safe and transparent way. So we spend a lot of time setting up AI guidelines, governance training … to oversee these cases. There’s actually a huge amount of trialing and testing across the business, 200 use cases.”

McCall then mentioned how Love Island has started working with an AI tool as an example of positive use cases. “We will use AI in any way we can to make what we do more efficient. And a great example of that for me is [how] Studios is using a tool, it’s a smart editing system, and it’s about speed and quality,” she explained. “They used it for Love Island casting this year, and the efficiency on that was so amazing. Junior editors’ output increased from two to four clips per session, and senior editors’ output rose from four to up to eight clips per session, so that productivity gain means that they can go and do other things, which is really, really good.”

On the call, Kevin Lygo, ITV’s managing director, media and entertainment, was asked about the firing of MasterChef host Gregg Wallace from the Banijay-produced BBC show, saying ITV is comfortable with its welfare policies. But he encouraged anyone with complaints to come forward as quickly as they can. “I would encourage anyone who feels belittled or troubled in any way to raise a complaint as soon as they feel they have been badly treated and we can deal with it quickly,” he said. “Some complaints are historic, and it becomes very difficult to come to a conclusion when people can’t remember what happened or someone else has a different view.”

Music Week noted a change of tone on streaming reform from the new government a year ago, as it pledged to “address concerns” over music creators’ earnings from streaming services.

Twelve months on, we have the package of reforms announced by Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy and Creative Industries Minister Chris Bryant (pictured together). 

The industry-led measures were part of the process overseen by the government in the Creator Remuneration Working Group. There’s also a commitment to monitor the measures for 12 months to ensure they are boosting income for music creators.

The issues with streaming income go back several years. The streaming inquiry launched almost five years ago during the pandemic; the CMS Select Committee’s streaming report, which called for a reset of the model, came out the following year. 

However, a subsequent CMA (Competition & Markets Authority) report in 2022 did not endorse such a thoroughgoing shake-up – arguing that streaming offers “new opportunities for global reach in a way previously unimaginable”. At the time, the BPI welcomed the “objective, evidence-based report which confirms that the streaming market is competitive – delivering fans accessible and affordable music and artists greater choice in an environment in which many more are succeeding and where artist and songwriter royalty rates have increased”. 

Almost three years on, however, DCMS ministers have decided to act. While there has been no overarching market intervention, they have now overseen a series of reforms having secured industry agreement – the most eye-catching of which was the £75 per diem from major labels to cover expenses for songwriters attending sessions.

Music Week understands that there was some tough negotiating in the run-up to the big announcement. 

Sir Chris Bryant certainly seems more engaged with music than most ministers in the previous Conservative government, with perhaps the exception of heavy metal fan and fellow knight of the realm, Sir John Whittingdale. And Sir Chris clearly expected to see results from the working group sessions.

“There are several areas where I’ve said that we might choose to legislate,” he told a Parliamentary committee in May. “Another area is in the remuneration of musicians and artists [from streaming]. If we have to legislate in that sphere, we will. And, of course, we’re looking at legislating in the secondary ticketing market.”

“The outcome of this process is a set of measures that are designed to deliver real benefits for UK creators,” stated the latest DCMS announcement.

The government said it marks a further step towards “improving terms and practices in relation to music streaming and ensuring the market works for everyone”, as well as a commitment to “far greater clarity on how legacy artists can seek renegotiation of their contracts”.

Best practice needs to reflect the diversity of business models across the independent sector

Gee Davy

As well as greater label support for songwriters and session musicians, there is also a suite of measures for legacy artists to ensure that they can all (not just the streaming catalogue stars) benefit from a streaming economy that was not even envisaged in their original contracts.

This agreement will sit alongside the Music Growth Package – with funding doubled up to £10 million a year for three years – announced as part of the Creative Industries Sector Plan.

“This government looks forward to the music industry advancing this work on music streaming and delivering on our objectives of promoting a sustainable music ecosystem that truly supports its creators,” added the DCMS statement.

The UK divisions of the three major label groups – Sony Music UK, Universal Music UK and Warner Music UK – have committed to implementing the principles. They will be communicating their own individual company programmes to benefit legacy artists, songwriters and musicians. 

The major company programmes alone represent an investment of tens of millions of pounds into the UK music industry by 2030, according to the BPI.  

The BPI also recommends the package to its 500-plus independent label members, who are encouraged to introduce similar targeted support in a “manner that is proportionate and fitting with the specifics of their businesses”.

The outcome of this process is a set of measures that are designed to deliver real benefits for UK creators

DCMS

While it appears that the majors have offered concessions beyond what the previous government might have brokered, Music Week understands that they are largely content with the conclusion to a lengthy process and multiple meetings of the Creator Remuneration Working Group. 

The measures on legacy artists chime with existing major label initiatives, such as Sony Music’s Legacy Unrecouped Balance Programme, which launched four years ago and has paid out millions of dollars to both qualifying artists and songwriters. 

If anything, the package may be more challenging for parts of the independent sector, which has not signed up to the songwriting payments measures (though it is being encouraged to adopt them). 

Looking back at Music Week’s streaming inquiry coverage in 2021, indie giant Beggars welcomed an increase in streaming royalty rates particularly for legacy acts – but also defended life of copyright deals and said any law allowing rights to revert would be “disastrous” for the company’s catalogue business.

“As the announcement highlights, best practice needs to reflect the diversity of business models across the independent sector. A uniform solution won’t be suitable for all,” said Association of Independent Music (AIM) CEO Gee Davy. “AIM encourages mutually respectful dialogue between labels and creators to ensure the best outcomes. AIM re-commits to continue to regularly engaging with other industry bodies to promote fair and sustainable practices that reflect today’s music economy.”

The fundamental problems with music streaming economics remain

Naomi Pohl

The measures don’t necessarily go far enough for all the key players in an industry debate that’s now been rumbling on for several years. 

Musicians’ Union general secretary Naomi Pohl said: “We are grateful to Minister Chris Bryant for the pressure he has put on record labels, and the majors in particular, to improve terms for artists on older contracts. While an uplift on minimum session rates was achieved by the MU in negotiation with the BPI last year, this doesn’t address a lack of royalties for session musicians and we also want to see modern royalty rates for all signed artists. 

“The fundamental problems with music streaming economics remain. For that reason, we will shortly launch a petition calling for copyright reform. We have also secured an additional meeting with the Minister in September to discuss session musician remuneration specifically.” 

The Council of Music Makers, which includes the Musicians’ Union, is still campaigning to ‘fix streaming’, including the following measures: 

– A minimum, modern digital royalty rate to apply on all signed artists’ contract regardless of when they were signed

– A rolling commitment to write-off unrecouped balances of signed artists after 20 years

– Rights reversion so artists and songwriters can reclaim their rights after a set period of time

– Streaming royalties for session musicians 

– A right to contract adjustment, which would mean updating unfair or outdated terms in old contracts. 

Having helped to bring about measures to help low income music creators, Sir Chris Bryant and his DCMS colleagues may well continue to face calls to intervene further in the streaming economy.

The full package of label-led measures unveiled by DCMS and created by the BPI is below.

PHOTO: Getty/Nicola Tree

PRINCIPLE 1 : Royalties & Commercial Support for Legacy Artists

The BPI recommends all UK labels provide bespoke financial support for legacy artists designed to improve their streaming outcomes by:

Disregarding unrecouped advances on contracts signed before 1 January 2000 for artists who have not received additional advances since that date and paying royalties to legacy artists at their contractual royalty rate.

And putting in place company initiatives that either: roll forward the cut-off dates for these policies on an annual basis.

Or

Provide a programme of bespoke support to revitalise legacy catalogues with the aim to generate ongoing income for artists. Participants will receive support which may include but is not limited to digitisation of deep catalogues, catalogue & artist marketing initiatives & spend and non-recoupable grants/funding.

PRINCIPLE 2 : Technical & Marketing Support for Legacy Artists

The BPI recommends all UK labels provide bespoke support for legacy artists designed to improve their streaming outcomes by:

Digitalising previously unexploited works from legacy artists’ deeper catalogues that are artistically and commercially viable so they can be distributed on DSPs. 

Providing bespoke marketing and administrative support so legacy artists can cultivate a modern-day audience with a focus on social platforms

Advising legacy artists on how to reactivate their full catalogues.

Reserving marketing budget and other funding specifically for legacy artists if needed.

PRINCIPLE 3 : Contract Renegotiation for Legacy Artists

The BPI recommends all UK labels provide bespoke support for legacy artists designed to improve their streaming outcomes by:

Responding meaningfully to initial queries and requests to renegotiate legacy contracts within 60 days from the date of receipt, although the actual renegotiations may take longer.

Advising legacy artists who are seeking to renegotiate legacy contracts on key elements, including clear information on who to contact and factors the label may consider during a negotiation.

Acting reasonably and in good faith in response to requests to renegotiate.

Taking a bespoke approach to each individual contract renegotiation and in coming to a determination consider holistically all elements of the contract and the context of the commercial history between the artist and the label. By way of example this may include:

–   The label’s investment to date in the artist’s career including by way of personal advances, recording costs, marketing and promotional support and tour support;

–   The nature of the artist’s musical genre (e.g. classical or pop)

–   The level of sales of the artist’s recordings

–   The artist’s existing royalty rates

–   The artist’s unrecouped balance (if any)

If a renegotiation is appropriate then the outcomes of such a renegotiation may include some of the following:

For artists whose royalty accounts remain unrecouped, disregarding some (or all) of any unrecouped balance or paying through a proportion of the artist’s royalties without regard to any unrecouped balance

Adjusting artists’ royalty rates on some formats and/or in some territories

The artist and label agreeing to new product and/or promotional commitments

Where an artist considers that a label has not engaged meaningfully in responding to a request to renegotiate within the 60 day timeframe, they should contact their most relevant trade organisation to escalate further dialogue with the label in question.

PRINCIPLE 4 : Supporting New and Emerging Songwriters

The BPI recommends all UK labels ensure emerging songwriters are not out of pocket when invited by a label to attend a songwriter session or camp, by acting in accordance with the following:

UK labels should create and communicate a clear policy to provide at least one of the following means of supporting songwriters on a case-by-case basis when they participate in a label hosted session:

Reimbursing a songwriter’s reasonable expenses and/or

Providing songwriters with a fixed per diem payment and/or

Providing other forms of financial support to upcoming songwriters

Labels should be transparent with featured artists as to whether the support provided to songwriters under this principle is a recoupable recording cost.

PRINCIPLE 5 : Increasing Minimum Session Fees for Pop and Classical Session Musicians

Labels should pay session musicians who perform on recordings upfront fees of at least the minimum rates set by the most recent agreement between the BPI and the Musicians’ Union (MU)*.

BPI commits to continue monitoring trends and fluctuations in combined broadcasting and public performance revenues and reviewing the BPI/MU Agreement accordingly.

* The new BPI/MU Agreement increases session fees by 40% for pop and 15% for classical sessions.

 

Scottish-German author Alexander Starritt’s debut, The Beast, followed a tabloid journalist; his second novel, We Germans, was about a Nazi. His new book gets us rooting for two wealthy management consultants fresh out of Oxford, both of them men (assuming you haven’t already tuned out). I suspect his agent might have found it easier to pitch a novel about sex criminals, not least because Drayton and Mackenzie’s approach is so unfashionably traditionalist: it’s a chunky, warmly observed, 9/11-to-Covid saga that, while comic in tone and often extremely funny, doesn’t labour under any obligation to send up its protagonists, still less take them down.

James Drayton, born to north London academics, is a socially awkward high achiever who privately measures himself against Christopher Columbus and Napoleon. Joining the McKinsey consultancy firm after coming top of his year in philosophy, politics and economics hasn’t eased the pressure he has always felt to “come up with something so brilliant it was irrefutable, like the obliterating ultra-white light of a nuclear bomb”.

The key to his sense of destiny arrives in the unlikely shape of a slacking junior colleague, Roland Mackenzie, who graduated with a 2:2 in physics (for James, a shame akin to “admitting erectile dysfunction”). Mutual suspicion thaws when they’re tasked with restructuring an Aberdeen oil firm in possession of the patents for a pioneering underwater turbine – tempting James and Roland to poach their star engineer, quit McKinsey and go it alone in green energy.

It’s a mark of Starritt’s confidence that the quest to harness tidal power – the book’s main business – gets going only 200 pages in. We feel in safe hands from the start, reassured that he knows the story’s every last turn (“In later years, when he was the subject of articles and interviews …” begins a line about James on the second page, his A-levels barely over). But we’re kept on our toes: while the narration hews to the point of view of the central duo, it fills in the period backdrop – bailouts, Brexit – by dipping unpredictably into the perspective of real-life figures such as the Italian politician and former president of the European Central Bank Mario Draghi, seen delivering his famous 2012 speech vowing to save the euro “whatever it takes”. As James and Roland jet around the world for venture capital, Starritt grants hefty speaking parts to PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel and Elon Musk (is he allowed to do that?, I asked myself: always a sign of a writer up to something exciting).

The plot is crammed with curveballs for the plucky entrepreneurs, whether it’s a shattered undersea cable, a coma caused by undiagnosed diabetes, or the dilemma that ensues when James and Roland fall for the same woman, having spent much of the novel joking uneasily about going to bed with each other. With a joyful knack for pithy analogy, the writing holds our attention as much as the events: the aforementioned relationship wrangle induces a “low eczemal itch of guilt” in the eventual girlfriend-stealer, while new parents drive home from the maternity ward feeling “like random civilians handed suits and guns and told to protect a miniature, defenceless president”.

There’s pathos as well as laughter in the protagonists’ beer-and-Champions League blokeishness, a way to keep unvoiced feeling at bay. When Roland, nearly 30, wistfully recalls a teenage holiday fling, he thinks that “she was probably someone’s mum by now”, a line hinting at his deep-lying sense of stasis, even as the company’s ambition grows: not just electricity, but rocket fuel.

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Because it concentrates on personalities rather than systems or ideas – not unlike Richard T Kelly’s 2023 North Sea oil novel, The Black Eden – Drayton and Mackenzie probably won’t be called “cli-fi” in the way that the novels of Richard Powers are, but it’s a reminder that science fiction isn’t the only game in town in terms of writing about the environment and technology.

Yet while there’s no shortage of chat about electrolysers and optimal blade rotation, Starritt keeps his focus on the human story of invention: dangling quietly over the action is the fact that James, lauded as a visionary, relies mostly for his ideas on other people. In the end, though, critique of disruptor-era genius is less important here than feeling and friendship; the winningly Edwardian, even Victorian, approach to storytelling extends right to the heart-swelling deathbed climax. It might have been subtitled A Love Story.

U.S. and global box office and total cinema revenue will not reach pre-COVID-19 pandemic levels by 2029, according to accounting firm PwC’s annual closely watched media and entertainment outlook report released late on July 23.

In the U.S., pre-pandemic total cinema revenue is not forecast to be reached by 2029 despite a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 3.9 percent. PwC had recorded nearly $11.7 billion in U.S. total cinema revenue in the pre-pandemic year 2019 after $11.8 billion in 2018. The firm projects the figure to rise from $8.9 billion in 2024 and $9.6 billion in 2025 to $10.1 billion in 2026, $10.3 billion in 2027, $10.6 billion in 2028 and $10.8 billion in 2029.

Asked by The Hollywood Reporter about how pre-COVID box office levels are not expected to be reached by 2029, Bart Spiegel, PwC global entertainment and media leader, says: “Unfortunately, this full recovery is unlikely within the forecast period. However, we project that by the end of 2029, the industry will be on the brink of a full rebound. In other words, 2030 may be the year global box office revenues return to pre-pandemic levels.”

Pre-COVID, U.S. box office in 2018 amounted to $10.8 billion before a 2019 drop to $10.7 billion. PwC forecasts the 2024 figure of $8.1 billion to grow to $8.7 billion this year. For the 2025-2029 period, it predicts a CAGR of 3.86 percent to push box office revenue to nearly $9.8 billion by the end of that period.

In terms of admissions, PwC lists 777 million for 2023, a drop to 734 million for 2024 and an estimated rebound to 778 million for 2025. It projects a 2.3 percent CAGR for the U.S. to 823 million in 2029, compared with 1.3 billion in 2019. By then, the average admission price will climb to $11.86, or “over $2 more than the $9.16 charged in 2020 and 2021,” the report explains.

Total U.S. cinema revenue in 2024 fell to $8.9 billion from $9.1 billion in 2023, “but the drop was anticipated and not as steep as had originally been feared,” highlighted the PwC report. (Yet it hit the bottom line of studios as well.) “The Writers Guild of America (WGA) and Screen Actors Guild–American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) strikes of late 2023 had slowed down production — and there were fewer ‘tentpole’ titles than would normally have been anticipated.”

For the global box office, PwC forecasts the 2024 figure of $29.7 billion to grow to $33.5 billion this year. It then predicts continued growth to $37.7 billion by the end of the Outlook report period in 2029, compared with $39.4 billion in 2019.

“It’s important to remember that industry revenues are ultimately driven by price times volume. In this case, while ticket prices are rising, admissions (volume) are not expected to return to pre-pandemic levels,” Spiegel says. “Instead, the growth in global box office revenue is being fueled by higher ticket prices. These ticket price increases are driven by several factors, including enhanced infrastructure and facilities, technological advancements, and rising content costs.”

The accounting firm notes that transition has hit Hollywood many times in the past, highlighting: “In recent years, the U.S. film sector has been disrupted. The streamers overturned traditional business models, the pandemic hit the box office, and the 2023 strikes stymied the post-COVID-19 recovery. But U.S. industry history reveals that the sector has experienced challenges many times before, with everything from the conversion to sound to the anti-trust legislation of the 1940s, the arrival of TV as a mass medium in the 1940s and 1950s, and the VHS revolution of the 1970s. In each case, the sector recovered. It is doing so again now.”

Here is a closer look at some of the U.S. cinema sector trends highlighted in PwC’s Global Entertainment & Media Outlook.

Franchise Films and Tentpoles

Growth in U.S. box office revenue this year “is again being driven, as in pre-COVID-19 years, by franchise movies building on existing IP — with Disney re-established as the pre-eminent player,” the report notes. The studio had three of the top five hits in the U.S. market in 2024: Inside Out 2, Deadpool & Wolverine, and Moana 2.… Each of the five major studios — Disney, Universal, Warner Bros., Sony and Paramount — had sizable hits. Universal’s Wicked, Despicable Me 4 and Twisters; Warner Bros.’ Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, Dune: Part Two and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire; Sony’s Bad Boys: Ride or Die and It Ends With Us; and Paramount’s Gladiator II and Sonic the Hedgehog 3 were all strong successes.”

PwC also points out that “blockbuster titles like Captain America: Brave New World, the live-action Snow White and live-action How to Train Your Dragon, motorsport drama F1, the latest reboot of Superman, Wicked: For Good, Zootopia 2, Mission: Impossible – the Final Reckoning and Avatar: Fire and Ash should ensure that 2025 is a reasonably robust year. In 2025, it is expected that 110 films will be produced and released in more than 2,000 sites in North America, up from 95 in 2024.”

Meanwhile, “an observation that has continued to be made over the last decade is that so-called mid-budget movies, which include award-contending dramas, are struggling at the box office,” PwC mentions. “These are the pictures that spectators seemingly prefer to watch at home.”

Concludes PwC: “The U.S. remains a very polarised market with a handful of ‘tentpole’ movies accounting for a vast amount of the profits.”

Windows Experiments

Experiments with day and date releasing, making big blockbusters available on streaming platforms with little or no period of exclusivity in cinemas, “have now been largely discarded,” the PwC report highlights. “This reveals a shift in the studios’ mindset and an acknowledgement that releasing in cinemas first is still regarded as the most reliable way to drive ancillary sales. Streamers involved in film production, like Amazon MGM and Apple, are also committing to 45-day theatrical windows for their bigger titles.”

Netflix remains focused on its streaming platform, though. “Netflix’s Oscar contender Emilia Pérez was given only a very brief theatrical release (primarily to ensure awards qualification) before being launched to stream on the Netflix platform,” notes the Outlook. “Emilia Pérez’s box office revenue was, relatively, low at around $15 million globally. The film secured 13 Oscar nominations despite not being seen widely on the big screen.”

Cinema Appeal

“U.S. exhibitors have been trumpeting research that suggests the public is re-embracing the theatrical experience,” PwC points out. “The National Association of Theatre Owners cited a report into cinema-going habits compiled by UCLA, which revealed that seeing a movie during opening weekend ranks as the number one preferred activity among 10–24-year-olds. This counters prevailing anxiety about the loss of a younger audience too preoccupied with TikTok and Instagram to go to cinemas. Market research also suggests that for certain genres — horror and comedy in particular — younger cinema-goers like to watch with their peers and to enjoy the shared experience.”

Theater Amenities

Cinema operators’ upgrades to luxury seats is “one factor driving admissions for more-affluent customers,” according to PwC. Loyalty and subscription programs offering discounts have also been on the rise. For 2024, the firm reports 119 million loyalty club members, up from 106 million in 2023.

“PLF is continuing to make gains,” the Outlook report also emphasizes. “In North America, 950 theatres now have large-format screens — a 37 percent increase from five years ago and a clear sign that cinema-goers are looking for a spectacular experience that can’t be replicated at home. A record number of at least 14 Hollywood and international releases shot with Imax cameras will hit cinemas in 2025 — and will be shown on the Imax global platform at the company’s 1,700 locations.”

Sony’s Alamo Deal Could Spur Theater Buys

Sony Pictures’ 2024 acquisition of exhibitor Alamo Drafthouse made Sony the first studio giant to move back into owning cinema assets. “Anti-trust legislation that had been in place for over 70 years, from 1948 to 2020, meant that Hollywood studios were previously prevented from owning their own movie theatres,” highlights PwC in its report. “There is the possibility that other U.S. studios will follow suit. This means they can again become fully vertically integrated — controlling production, distribution and exhibition, just as they did during their heyday from the 1920s to the 1940s.”