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The Concession Stand

• Barbra – Barbra Streisand’s memoir – is the best audiobook since Robert Evans’ and must 100% be a series. Can you imagine?? Mem’ries … People … Somewhere … give me the Sherman-Palladinos and Rachel Sennot and I’ll give you ten Emmys a year!  

• Currently loving: Feud with the Swans and The Gentlemen on FX — I will not brook any criticism of either. 

• Reddit (RDDT) goes public today. They have 267MM weekly users (including me), $804MM in annual revenue, they spend $438MM per year on R&D, and their annual operating loss is $140MM. Whatcha researching pals? Seems like your website doesn’t change that much…

• Iger identified his favorite successor candidates. Two people with no tech experience and two people with no film and TV experience. It’s just like Singin’ in the Rain, which is about silent film actors who have to make a sound musical – it’s funny because they only kinda know what they’re doing! 

• Pretty good summary of the crypto market right now as memecoins on the Solana blockchain have seized a moment:

• Yes, I am going to get back to looking at box office and so on but recently there hasn’t been much to look at! Obviously, we need more movies. 

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This is not a piece about how the olden days were better, but the other night I went to see Network at The Aero. 

I do not think I am crazy to say that there used to be more movies that had thoughts inside. I mean … Dr. Strangelove, A Clockwork Orange, Soylent Green, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, All the President’s Men... Just imagine being in Cannes in 1957 and walking out of Ingmar Bergman’s Seventh Seal and its depiction of Death.

Also in 1957 — Irwin Allen shot a picture at Warner Bros. with the Marx Brothers, Hedy Lamarr, Peter Lorre, Vincent Price and Dennis Hopper called The Story of Mankind where the Devil and the Spirit of Man argue over whether humanity is good or evil. I mean, you can’t book every role but sometimes you have to ask your agent — how did I not even get to read for this picture?

Novels used to be the same way. Think about Franny and Zooey (1961). Think about John Cheever’s story “The Swimmer” (1964). Bonfire of the Vanities (1987). Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man (1952). You can like them or not but they were definitely trying to engage with ideas, they achieved a certain level of popularity and they were discussed. We have previously pointed out the fact that James Joyce was on the cover of Time Magazine in 1934 when apparently we were all smarter. 

Are ideas more or less popular in popular media today than in the past? Are they the Mincemeat Pie or Suet of the modern cultural table? I would say obviously they are less popular today. Other than Black Mirror, where are these ideas you speak of? Maybe Get Out? A few obscure novels? Coaxed a couple of notions out of Normal People did you? I am talking about full-fledged IDEAS in POPULAR fiction and film. 

Anyway, we’re not professors, so who cares? But I will ask you this. If you accept, for now, my premise that there are now fewer thought-provoking and idea-driven titles than there were, is this just the natural evolution of things where “all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds” as Candide would say, is this the consequence of the growing importance of international distribution as Ted Hope’s recent piece suggests, or is this an opportunity? Should there be more? Are people waiting for more cerebral or tantalizing, thought-provoking premises? 

I am open to this idea. Maybe people should be less scared of it. After all, I left out Barbie above. I think there were some ideas baked into that beautiful, pink cake. Maybe we aren’t giving ourselves enough credit. Most things have a way of coming back eventually. Get me Charlie Kaufman on line one! 

Paramount

Ms. Redstone and her shares. It sounds like something Ella Fitzgerald might belt out from the Cole Porter songbook. But what the whole National Amusements-Paramount setup is going to yield if she sells to David Ellison or Apollo is firstly a lot of taxes and secondly, almost certainly, a lot of lawsuits from the holders of Paramount Class A shares. It’s hard to imagine this being a fantastic and thrilling experience. Moreover, obviously Paramount now is at a low ebb in terms of value. 

Could it get worse? Of course. The trajectory is negative. Despite having ascended heights in the past, it could get worse. However, hear me out. Right now, Redstone has a claim on I think 10% of Paramount which is ~$700MM. What if the equity value tripled (which is to go back 24 months in terms of perception)? Then she would have $2.1B in value. Now, by the way, she has 10% ownership but 70% control so the value of her shares is a bit more complex than just 10% but I am simplifying this analysis. If the value of Paramount could organically triple (whatever the value of her holding may be), she gets the benefit of that value in various ways and does not have to sell for some time. If she sells now, she gets $700MM minus tax. Let’s say she gets $350MM. On the other hand, if PARA tripled organically, she could be holding $2.1B, which she could leave to her heirs, who could get a step up in basis upon her demise, avoiding hundreds of millions or a billion in taxes. If they sold as soon as they inherited (which they would not have to do, but let’s say), there is a big difference between having $350MM and $2.1B (and let’s be honest — if you have to split $350MM three or four ways, are you even rich?). So this organic growth plan is very desirable. 

How could this be achieved? They could try to just grow using their own internal capital and plans. They are trying to do this but it isn’t going incredibly well.

Plan B would be to execute a tax free stock-for-stock merger with WBD. The combined company, I would argue, would have a realistic prospect of dramatically accelerating its SVOD growth rate and achieving significantly higher multiples (which their near term cash flow-focused strategy has not done). This is the path to victory and wealth.

People faded that merger and even the parties seem to have given it up, but I still maintain, as I said before, that this is the best future for everyone. 

Oh, and by the way, to anticipate an objection, let’s do a simple math quiz – if there are two people who each have income of $5 and each pay interest of $2 every year (40%), and they marry so that they have income of $10 and pay interest of $4 (40%), are their interest payment “problems” worse? No, they are not worse. Number is bigger. But not worse. Most journalists have been struggling with this. 

A bientôt

RP

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Roy Price was an executive at Amazon.com for 13 years, where he founded Amazon Video and Studios. He developed 16 patented technologies. His shows have won 14 Best Series Emmys and Globes. He was formerly at McKinsey & Co. and The Walt Disney Co. He graduated from Harvard College in 1989.