Category: media

After months of speculation that a cash-rich Chinese bidder, or one from Bollywood, might pick up a debt laden Hollywood property such as MGM, Chengtian CEO Chen Xiaowei, formerly president of Nasdaq-listed The9 — one of China’s largest online gaming companies — called Chengtian’s partnership with hit-factory Legendary a “match built in heaven.”

Of the seven highest-rated premieres so far, five were comedies.

“As indie music scenes in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal have flourished in the past decade, building enthusiastic audiences in Canada and internationally without much support from radio play, some in the industry have come to consider the regulations largely irrelevant.”

“Video was supposed to kill the radio star, but the reality has turned out to be quite different: More Britons are listening to the radio than ever — more than 90% of all adults in this nation of 60 million people.”

“New-tech rivals such as Netflix, Apple and Google, traditional TV distributors like cable and satellite companies face stiffer competition for programming.”

The unions, under the umbrella of the International Federation of Actors (FIA), said performers in New Zealand had “struggled on non-union contracts” for some years. Those contracts “provide no minimum guarantees of wages or working conditions”, no payment for future broadcasts and no cancellation payments, they said.

As well as dramas, which have been a part of the World Service English schedules for more than 75 years, highlights programmes dedicated to The Proms and the Wimbledon tennis championships will also end.

Let the commercial networks chase after the 18-to-34 males; how much TV do they even watch? A group of public broadcasting executives is launching “Next Avenue,” a broadcast-and-online project aimed at America’s roughly 77 million 45-to-65-year-olds, who do watch TV, use the Web and spend money.

“A real-life plot involving lawsuits, egos and a Frenchman in a balaclava has brought chaos to the filming of … Radford’s Spanish-language film project, La Mula.” The director, best known for Il Postino, is seeking an injunction against the film’s Spanish co-producers halting all further work.

“Fantastic Fest, a festival in Austin, Tx., that devotes itself to genre cinema, likes attention-getting stunts.” For instance, placing four participants inside coffins to watch (on screens on the coffin lids) the movie Buried, whose protagonist is trapped in a coffin.