TGIF! Here's the latest on TikTok, Pamela Paul, Charles Blow, Unrivaled, "Beast Games," and more. We're going to start with three entertainment world stories...
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The drama stemming from "It Ends with Us" may never end. This is, as CNN's Elizabeth Wagmeister said on air, "ALL-OUT WAR by Hollywood standards."
Yesterday, director Justin Baldoni sued his co-star Blake Lively, alleging civil extortion, defamation, and invasion of privacy, weeks after Lively accused Baldoni of sexual harassing her and orchestrating a smear campaign against her. Lively's legal team responded last night by saying, "this is an age-old story: A woman speaks up with concrete evidence of sexual harassment and retaliation and the abuser attempts to turn the tables on the victim."
Every new legal filing reads like a spec script, complete with backstabbing text messages and email receipts and other dramatic flourishes. Spouses and publicists and production companies are all entangled. Even Taylor Swift is name-checked in the newest suit. Check out Wagmeister's story for details. I also highly recommend reading the PDF's of the suits – here is Lively's Dec. 31 complaint against Baldoni, and here is Baldoni's new complaint against her.
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The FireAid benefit concert for Los Angeles wildfire victims is coming together quickly. Native Angelenos Billie Eilish, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Gracie Abrams are among the performers, along with a huge list of other stars. "The performances will take place on January 30 at two venues, the Kia Forum and the new Intuit Dome," CNN's Alli Rosenbloom reports. All the major streamers have committed to showing the concert, along with iHeartRadio stations and other platforms. As Alex Weprin observed, it's a "sign of the times that benefit concerts are now focused on getting on all the streaming services..."
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Inside the control room on 'September 5' |
"September 5" opens wide today. Rotten Tomatoes sums up the critical praise for the film this way: "Capturing the compromises, dedication, and human fallibility of the newsroom, 'September 5' is a worthy chronicle of a tragic flashpoint in broadcast media history." Portraying ABC's close-up coverage of the Munich massacre during the 1972 Summer Olympics, it's "a media movie for media junkies," Drew Lerner of Awful Announcing writes. "But even those with no background or interest in media will find the film compelling." CNN's David Daniel has a video sneak peek here.
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Three more big showbiz stories |
>> Season two of "Severance" premieres today, almost three years after the first season left us spellbound. Creators Dan Erickson and Ben Stiller sat down with Kayla Cobb to explain why it took so long to make... (TheWrap)
>> On Saturday, Dave Chappelle will host the first "SNL" of the year... (Beast)
>> Matt Belloni's overnight scoop: He says "Greta Gerwig broke Netflix and its no-theaters rule. She's getting a unique release for 'Narnia' and a pretty long window of exclusivity." It's a "major, precedent-setting deal months in the making..." (Puck)
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As first reported by NYMag's Charlotte Klein this morning, Kathleen Kingsbury is making some changes to the NYT's Opinion section. Two columnists, Pamela Paul and Charles Blow, "are winding down their tenure in Opinion over the next several weeks," Kingsbury said in an internal memo. Newsletter writer Peter Coy and Op-Docs senior editor Christine Kecher are also departing...
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Time for the TikTok ruling |
Chief Justice John Roberts asked the pivotal question last week: "Are we supposed to ignore the fact" that TikTok's parent company "is, in fact, subject to doing intelligence work for the Chinese government?"
Many lawmakers and officials are trying to ignore that right now. (Yesterday Trump's incoming national security adviser Mike Waltz said on Fox that "we will put measures in place to keep TikTok from going dark.") But the SCOTUS ruling about TikTok – which is expected at 10 a.m. ET today – will put the national security concerns front and center once again.
As I discussed with Kasie Hunt this morning, users will gravitate to other apps if they have to, but there is no perfect TikTok clone. Other Chinese-owned apps continue to top the American charts; Xiaohongshu a/k/a RedNote is looking to sell shares "at a valuation of at least $20 billion," taking advantage of the recent surge of interest, Bloomberg's
Lulu Yilun Chen and Dong Cao report...
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For tech moguls and Trump, it's time to celebrate |
"The elite of Silicon Valley are set to revel in their new clout during a long weekend of inaugural parties," the NYT's Theodore Schleifer and Kenneth P. Vogel write, previewing a party hosted by the "All-In" podcasters and a Spotify brunch "featuring Joe Rogan, Megyn Kelly and Ben Shapiro..."
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A rare walk-back by Apple |
Liam Reilly writes: Apple is temporarily pulling its newly introduced artificial intelligence feature that summarizes news notifications after it repeatedly sent users error-filled headlines, sparking backlash from a news organization and press freedom groups. The company plans to re-enable the feature in a future update. Details here...
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>> Two independent journalists "who are outspoken critics of U.S. support for Israel" interrupted Secretary of State Antony Blinken's final press conference yesterday. (Reuters)
>> Yona TR Golding chronicles how journalists in Israel and Gaza responded to the initial news of a ceasefire. (CJR) |
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