Trump Signs Order Aiming to Cut Funds to PBS, NPR; Streaming Is Crowded With Ads; 'Lilo & Stitch' and 'M:I 8' Set for Biggest Memorial Day Box Office Ever

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View on web New reader? Subscribe May 02, 2025 What's news: Russell Brand arrived at a London court after being charged with rape and sexual assault. The View has bagged Joe and Jill Biden's first interview. Apple expects Trump's tariffs to add $900m to its quarterly costs. Roku has acquired Frndly TV for $185m. Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy is shifting to a new role. — Abid Rahman Do you have THR's next big story? Confidentially share tips with us at tips@thr.com. Trump Signs Order Aiming to Cut Funds to PBS, NPR  ►Slashing continues. Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order aiming to slash public subsidies to PBS and NPR as he alleged “bias” in the broadcasters’ reporting. The order instructs the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and other federal agencies "to cease Federal funding for NPR and PBS" and further requires that they work to root out indirect sources of public financing for the news organizations. The White House, in a social media posting announcing the signing, said the outlets “receive millions from taxpayers to spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as ‘news.’” It’s the latest move by Trump and his administration to utilize federal powers to control or hamstring institutions whose actions or viewpoints he disagrees with. NPR and PBS get roughly half a billion dollars in public money through the CPB, and have been preparing for the possibility of stiff cuts since Trump’s election. The story.  —Big get. Former President Joe Biden and first lady Dr. Jill Biden will sit for their first TV interview since leaving the White House on The View. The Bidens will join hosts Whoopi Goldberg, Joy Behar, Sunny Hostin, Sarah Haines, Alyssa Farah Griffin and Ana Navarro live on the May 8 edition of the ABC daytime show. The former first couple will discuss their life after the presidency, Joe Biden’s legacy and the current political landscape. That Joe Biden would choose The View for his first on-camera interview after the end of his presidency is not a surprise. He has been a guest on the show 10 times in the past, including in September 2024 when he became the first sitting president to appear live on the show. The story. —Heading south. Fox News co-host Steve Doocy is the latest high-profile news anchor to shift to a new role. The Fox & Friends co-host said Thursday that he is moving to Florida, and will work three days per week as the “coast-to-coast co-host” for the morning show, anchoring from the south, midwest, and other parts of the country. Or as Doocy put it: “It’s going to make it easier for me to report from Florida and other parts of America that don’t get a lot of network airtime. I’ll be going from the Carolinas to the Keys. From Middle America to Mar-a-Lago” The story.  Russell Brand Arrives at U.K. Court to Face Sexual Assault Charges  ►The latest. Russell Brand arrived at London’s Westminster Magistrates Court on Friday after being charged with rape and sexual assault. The disgraced comedian’s first hearing took place after it was confirmed last month that the U.K.’s Crown Prosecution Service authorized the Metropolitan Police to charge a man, identified as 49-year-old Brand, following an investigation by detectives. Brand has been charged with one count of rape, one count of indecent assault, one count of oral rape and two counts of sexual assault. The crimes he has been charged with relate to a 1999 rape in the Bournemouth area of the U.K.; a 2001 indecent assault of a woman in Westminster, London; the 2004 oral rape and sexual assault of a woman in Westminster, London; and between 2004 and 2005, the sexual assault of a woman in Westminster, London. Brand denies the allegations. The story.  —Guilty. A man has pleaded guilty to hacking the computer of a former Disney employee, whose information was used to obtain and leak troves of data about the entertainment giant’s theme park and streaming businesses. As part of a deal with federal prosecutors, Ryan Mitchell Kramer, a California resident, pleaded guilty on Thursday to two charges related to illegally breaking into a computer system to access information, which each carry a maximum sentence of five years in prison. Last year, a collection of data that shed light about Disney’s operations — including sales of Genie+ theme park passes, pricing offers the company has modeled and Disney+ streaming revenue — was leaked online by hackers. The story.  Streaming Is Now Just As Crowded With Ads As Old School TV  ►Back to the future. THR's Rick Porter writes that an early promise of streaming platforms was that users would be able to watch series and movies without the commercials that break up programming on broadcast or cable networks. That’s no longer the case: Almost every major streamer has an ad-supported tier, and new data from Nielsen suggests that a good number of viewers are using them. The ratings provider has released its first Ad Supported Gauge, showing that nearly three-fourths of TV use — 72.4 percent — in the first quarter was from ad-supported platforms, whether traditional network and cable outlets or streaming with ads. Only 27.6 percent of viewing in the U.S. was commercial-free. The story.  —$900m tariffs charge! Apple delivered revenue of $95.36b for the second quarter of 2025 overshadowed by sweeping new tariffs imposed on China by the Trump administration. The tech giant's overall revenues, up 5 percent year-on-year, surpassed analyst expectations after a consensus estimate from FactSet forecast Apple would record $94.4b in revenue. Apple’s services segment, which includes Apple TV+, Apple Music, Apple Arcade and other products, posted overall revenue of $26.65b, up 11.6 percent from a year-earlier $23.8b and a slight miss on an analyst consensus estimate for $26.70b for Q2 2025. The company forecast Trump’s tariffs, absent new ones, will add around $900m in costs for Apple for the April-to-June 2025 quarter for its global-spanning business. The results.  —Worrying slide. Live Nation reported $3.3b in revenue for the first financial quarter of 2025, an 11 percent drop from the particularly strong Q1 the live music giant had posted a year ago. Adjusted operating income fell 6 percent to $341m from 362.5m year over year. In the concerts division, revenue fell 14 percent to $2.84b, and ticketing revenue fell 4 percent to $694.7m. Sponsorship and advertising, however, grew slightly, up 2 percent to $216.1m. While the year has started out slower, in its report, Live Nation points to $5.4b in deferred revenue for concerts and another $270m in deferred revenue on tickets — a 24 percent and 13 percent bump for each category — which the company said suggests stronger figures in the months ahead as the concert season gets more into full swing. The results.  —🤝 Sold! 🤝 Roku is making a significant acquisition that will propel it further in the content space. The streaming platform says that it is acquiring the subscription streaming service Frndly TV in a deal valued at $185m. The deal, which should be completed in Q2, will give Roku a foothold in the subscription streaming market and vMVPD sector, complementing its free Roku Channel. Frndly blends aspects of virtual multichannel video providers like YouTube TV with on-demand entertainment programming, with a focus on family-friendly fare. It streams channels that include Hallmark, History, Lifetime and A&E. Its plans start at $6.99 per month. The story. —Up and up. Roku CEO Anthony Wood’s total pay package increased to $27.7m in 2024, up from $20.2m the year before. His pay package included a base salary of $1.1m and option awards of $26.6m. He received $18,848 in medical and life insurance premiums. Wood’s base salary dropped slightly from his 2023 total of $1.2m, the company’s compensation committee determined that only 4 percent of the CEOs total compensation should be paid in salary, with the rest more heavily weighted towards equity awards “to further strengthen the alignment of the interests of our CEO with the interests of our stockholders.” The story. —Trending down. AMC Networks has unveiled the 2024 compensation packages paid out to the leadership team of the company that operates such cable networks as AMC, IFC and Sundance TV and such streaming services as horror streamer Shudder. CEO Kristin Dolan earned $8.69m in 2024 compared with $14.6m in 2023, the firm disclosed in a regulatory filing with the SEC. Dolan, who was named chief of the company in Feb. 2023, received a base salary of $2m last year, against a $1.65m base salary in 2023. Dolan succeeded Christina Spade after a cost-cutting program, including layoffs, was unveiled in late 2022. (She is married to James Dolan, who is chairman of AMC Networks and controls the company.) The story.  Peabody Awards 2025  ►🏆 Congrats! 🏆 The Peabody Awards has announced its 2025 winners, recognizing television radio/podcast and web content in the areas of entertainment, news, documentary, arts, children’s/youth, public service and interactive/immersive programming and media. Netflix led with six awards, four in the documentary category for Daughters, Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa, The Remarkable Life of Ibelin and Will & Harper, and two in entertainment for Baby Reindeer and Ripley. HBO/Max followed with four awards for the documentaries Night is Not Eternal, STAX: Soulsville U.S.A. and The Truth vs. Alex Jones, as well as the show Fantasmas. PBS landed three wins for One With the Whale, Mr Bates vs The Post Office and The Only Doctor. Additional winners in the entertainment category include Peacock's We are Lady Parts and FX's Shogun and Say Nothing. The winners. —🏆 Clear leader. 🏆 The Critics Choice Association has revealed its nominees for the 2025 Critics Choice Real TV Awards: The Traitors, once again, led the nominations. The show earned six nominations overall, including best competition series, best ensemble cast in an unscripted series and best show host for Alan Cumming. At last year’s awards show, The Traitors was the big winner, taking home four trophies. Dancing with the Stars and Top Chef followed with four nominations each. The nominations.  —🏆 Contenders. 🏆 Also on Thursday, the National Academy of Television Arts revealed the nominees for the 46th annual News & Documentary Awards. The nominees for outstanding live new program include ABC World News Tonight with David Muir, The CBS Evening News with Norah O’Donnell, CBS Mornings, Good Morning America, NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt and Top Story with Tom Llamas. In the best documentary category, nominees include American Conspiracy: The Octopus Murders, The Commandant’s Shadow, The Grab, Hollywood Black, Mammals, Queendom, The Sing Sing Chronicles, The Sixth and The Truth vs. Alex Jones. The nominations.  —🏆 Jacked. 🏆 Jack Antonoff was honored as ASCAP's pop songwriter of the year at the performing rights organization’s 2025 Pop Awards held at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles on Thursday evening. Antonoff was recognized for his co-writes on songs like Sabrina Carpenter’s smash hit “Please Please Please,” as well as for his work on Taylor Swift’s “Anti-Hero,” “Fortnight,” “I Can Do It with a Broken Heart,” “Is It Over Now? (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)” and “Karma.” One of the most prolific songwriter-producers in the industry, last year he produced Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department several tracks on Kendrick Lamar’s GNX and on Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet. Teddy Swims "Lose Control," co-written by ASCAP songwriter Joshua 'Ammo' Coleman, won pop song of the year. The winners.  Peacock's Next 4 Scripted Shows Are From Digital Creators ►"They wrote them, they produce them, they star in them as well." THR's Alex Weprin has the scoop that Peacock will debut four new original series later this month, with a twist: The shows were all developed by social-first video creators. The streamer will debut the four scripted shows under the Peacock Emerging Artist Series banner on May 19, with all episodes available at launch. The shows are The Warehouse Phase (from creator Charlie Curtis-Beard), The Kouncil (from creator Katie Florence), Older Hotter Wiser (from creator Serena Kerrigan ), and People Like Me (from creator Daren Vongirdner). The story.  —📅 Dated! 📅 HBO is promising more high-society unrest in season three of The Gilded Age. The network has set a June 22 premiere date released a first teaser for the drama’s forthcoming season. The teaser shows Bertha Russell (Carrie Coon) sticking to her “too much is never enough” ethos and preparing to marry off her daughter, Gladys (Taissa Farmiga) — a prospect which, judging by Farmiga’s expression in a few shots in the minute-long clip, doesn’t excite Gladys very much. The story.  —"Call me." Gillian Anderson is teasing whether she would return for Ryan Coogler‘s planned X-Files reboot. The actress who played Agent Dana Scully in the original series recently shared during a recent interview that she spoke to the Sinners filmmaker. “I spoke to [Coogler], and what I said was, ‘If anyone were to do it, I think you are the perfect person, and best of luck,'” Anderson said, adding that she told Coogler, “Call me.” As for whether The Salt Path actress would genuinely consider returning for the reboot, Anderson kept her response vague, saying, “At some point, if the phone rings and it’s good and it feels like the right time, perhaps.” The story.  —Know your worth. Jeremy Renner is revealing why he isn't returning to Disney+ for Hawkeye season two. The actor claims he was only offered half of his original season one salary by “the penny pinchers” at Disney. What’s more, Renner says this happened after his devastating 2023 snowplow accident, which nearly cost him his life, and took months of rehabilitation to recover from — adding insult to literal injury. In a podcast interview, Renner said: “They asked me to do season two, and they offered me half the money. I’m like, wow, it’s going to take me twice the amount of work for half the amount of money — eight months of my time, essentially, and you do it for half the amount? I’m like, ‘I’m sorry, why? Did you think I’m only half the Jeremy because I got ran over?’ Is that why want to pay me half of what I made on the first season?” The story.  —Mike White does it again! Two series scored their best weekly streaming performances ever in early April, both of which came in the week leading up to their finales. HBO's The White Lotus took over the No. 1 overall spot on Nielsen’s streaming charts for March 31-April 6. It recorded 1.31b minutes of viewing on Max for the week, including just a few hours of viewing its April 6 season finale. Paramount+’s 1923 also topped the billion-minute threshold in the week before its second season finale (which also debuted April 6), coming in at 1.06b minutes. Both are series highs so far for the two shows. The streaming rankings.  'Lilo & Stitch' and 'M:I 8' Set for Biggest Memorial Day Box Office Ever  ►Bonanza. THR's Pamela McClintock writes that the box office is headed for a record-breaking Memorial Day weekend. According to tracking, the combination of Disney’s live-action redo of Lilo & Stitch and Paramount’s Tom Cruise-starrer Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning could mark another Barbenheimer moment for both Hollywood and hungry theater owners. Lilo & Stitch is headed for a four-day domestic debut of $120m, one of the best showings ever for Disney’s live-action reimaginings, according to those with access to data from leading firm the National Research Group. The leading research firm also gives ranges in addition to a target number; in this case, it is $110m to $130m. M:I 8, meanwhile, is on course for a franchise-best $80m debut, which would more than make up for the lackluster $54.7m bow of the previous film in the series, as well as zoom past the record $61.2m three-day launch of Mission: Impossible — Fallout. NRG’s range is $72m to $88m. The box office report.  —🎭 Punching Nazis is good 🎭 Gal Gadot and Matthias Schoenaerts are set to star in World War II feature Ruin. Niki Caro is directing the thriller movie from a script by Kaz Firpo and Ryan Firpo that topped the Black List in 2017. Principal photography is aiming to begin in early 2026, with The Veterans overseeing international sales rights and taking the project to Cannes buyers this month. UTA Independent Film Group, WME Independent and CAA Media Finance are handling U.S. rights. Ruin is set in the rubble of Germany following World War II, with a newly released camp prisoner (Gadot) forming an alliance with a German soldier (Schoenaerts) as they both seek revenge on a Nazi Schutzstaffel unit. The story.  'Oh, Mary!'s Cole Escola on Tony Noms ►"If I'm allowed to be sincere, today would be the day." THR's Caitlin Huston spoke to Cole Escola about the Tony nomination for their role as Mary Todd Lincoln in Oh, Mary! The play, which Escola wrote, also received a nomination for best play. "It makes me want to cry just thinking about us making our show in the rehearsal room at La MaMa, just hoping it would land with our audience," Escola said. The interview.  —"To have that kind of recognition is just overwhelming." Caitlin also spoke to Audra McDonald about the historic 11th Tony nomination the actress received on Thursday. The stage icon reflects on the "tornado" of a role in the Broadway production of Gypsy and gives her thoughts on becoming the most Tony-nominated performer in history. The interview.  —"A close personal friend struggles with [depression], and I mapped Sentry’s arc off of a lot of things that he’s experienced." THR's Brian Davids spoke to filmmaker Jake Schreier about his new movie, Thunderbolts*. Schreier explains the origins of that A24-style trailer, how he infused a bit of Netflix's Beef into the MCU, and jokes about THR's own cameo in the feature. The interview.  Thank Pod It's Friday ►All the latest content from THR's podcast studio. —Awards Chatter. THR's executive awards editor Scott Feinberg talks to the great and the good of Hollywood. In this episode, Scott spoke to Bruce Springsteen. In a rare and candid in-depth interview, the rock and roll legend reflects on his complicated childhood and path to the music biz, inspirations behind his greatest hits, thoughts on the upcoming Jeremy Allen White movie about him, the Hulu doc Road Diary, about his first post-COVID tour (which could bring him the 'E' that would make him an 'EGOT') and more. Listen here. In other news... —Netflix's new releases coming in May 2025 —TV premiere dates 2025: The complete guide —Ed Sheeran sets Play release date, drops second single "Old Phone" —The Weeknd returns to WME for representation in all areas —Aisha Bowe, Blue Origin astronaut, signs with CAA ​​​What else we're reading... —Nate Jones writes that if there are 10 best film contenders better than Ryan Coogler's Sinners by January, then we're in for a banner year [Vulture] —Jay Peters reports that Spotify already has an app ready to test Apple’s new rules following the Epic Games verdict [Verge] —Arthur C. Brooks looks into why young people everywhere are so unhappy [Atlantic] —Constance Grady reflects on the insane situation that has seen the #MeToo backlash reach a point where people are claiming Harvey Weinstein is innocent [Vox] —Here's your Friday list: "Dwayne Johnson films – ranked!" [Guardian] Today...   ...in 1968, Paramount’s big-screen adaptation of stage hit The Odd Couple opened in New York at Radio City Music Hall. The film went on to be nominated for two Oscars at the 41st Academy Awards, for editing and for Neil Simon’s adapted screenplay. The original review. Today's birthdays: Dwayne Johnson (53), Matt Berry (51), Christine Baranski (73), Kumail Nanjiani (47), Mae Martin (38), Lily Allen (40), Golda Rosheuvel (55), Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck (52), Bruce Robinson (79), Stephen Daldry (65), David Beckham (50), Ellie Kemper (45), Elizabeth Berridge (63), David Suchet (79), Kay Panabaker (35), Chiara Gensini (43), Jenna Lamia (50), Andrea Bang (36), Matt Gerald (55), Jenna von Oÿ (48), Robert Buckley (44), Gaius Charles (42), Brian Tochi (66), Mitzi Kapture (63), Josh Bolt (31), Tim Rock (44), Hazal Subasi (30), Vincent Tong (45), Skye Bennett (30), Thomas McDonell (39), Sallie Harmsen (36), Emily Hart (39), Anna McGahan (37) Jill Sobule, the singer-songwriter behind “I Kissed a Girl,” the first openly gay track to break into the Billboard Top 20, has died. She was 66. The obituary. ADVERTISEMENT This email was sent to punjabsvera@gmail.com by The Hollywood Reporter. 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