What I’m Hearing: The Nevins-Showtime Bid, ‘Creed’ Windfall & Nancy Meyers’ Netflix Kitchen

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Welcome back to What I’m Hearing, and happy Oscar week. We’ll do another ratings contest on Thursday, so start thinking about your guess.

Programming notes: This week on The Town: Lucas Shaw and I debated the Writers Guild demands, I dived into the Fox News bombshells with Dylan Byers, and I askedOscar Wars author Michael Shulman about the dirtiest campaigns ever. Plus, I was interviewed on PBS News Hour about the future of movie theaters. Watch here. Also, I’ll be in D.C. on Wednesday for Puck’s big event with Washington newsmakers at the French Ambassador’s residence. Make sure you say hi if you’re there.

Discussed in this issue: Shari Redstone, David Young, Nancy Meyers, David Nevins, Adam Aron, Scarlett Johansson, Suzanne Scott, Peter Rice, Tracey Pakosta, Rick Yorn, The Weeknd, and Chris Rock’s afterparty…

But first…

Who Won the Week: Irwin Winkler and Michael B. Jordan

Easy one. Winkler, the 90-something Rocky/Creed producer, endured all those attacks by Sylvester Stallone and gets credit for giving Creed III directing duties to MBJ, who delivered a $58.7 million domestic opening weekend and...

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Why Won’t Shari Redstone Sell Showtime?

Paramount’s owner and her C.E.O., Bob Bakish, thwarted a $3 billion-plus bid from David Nevins in favor of their own plan to merge Showtime with Paramount+. But some analysts and company investors think that’s as insane as five ‘Billions’ spin-offs.

MATTHEW BELLONI

Is Paramount’s potential deal to sell Showtime really dead? Not if you talk to a wistful corner of the media investor community, which readily perked up when the Journal reported last week that Paramount Global owner Shari Redstone had rebuffed several offers for Showtime—including a recent $3 billion-plus bid from former top executive David Nevins and the private equity group General Atlantic. To many, that’s a no-brainer deal for a struggling unit of a company that’s worth only $15 billion in total and is facing a cratering cable television business. I’m told that...

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