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Good morning,
Thanks for reading The Backstory, your weekly review of the best new work emanating from Puck.
It was yet another incredibly fabulous week here: John Heilemann sat down with Doug Emhoff; Matt Belloni reported on Ted Sarandos’s transparency conversion; Bill Cohan penetrated the S.B.F. legal bunker; Tara Palmeri gathered the latest Mar-a-Lago murmurs; Rachel Strugatz scooped some Glossier news; Lauren Sherman I.D.’d the Olsen twins’ new investors; Dylan Byers offered a talmudic reading of an ESPN shocker; John Ourand assessed the election’s NFL angle; and Marion Maneker analyzed UTA’s art pivot.
Check out these stories, and others, via the links below. And stick around for the backstory on how it all came together.
P.S., in celebration of Puck’s third anniversary, we’re pleased to offer 20 percent off an annual subscription. Click here to claim this very limited-time deal!
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FASHION:
Lauren Sherman digs into The Row’s cap table and chats with Yael Aflalo about life after Reformation.
and…
Rachel Strugatz has the dish on Glossier’s two new fragrances, and its exit strategy.
ART MARKET:
Marion Maneker figures out why UTA abandoned the art business.
HOLLYWOOD:
Matt Belloni assesses Netflix’s performance in its new era of transparency.
SILICON VALLEY:
Eriq Gardner analyzes TikTok’s brutal day in court.
WALL STREET:
Bill Cohan solves the banks’ M&A paradox and breaches the S.B.F. legal bunker.
MEDIA:
Dylan Byers peers into the Olivia Nuzzi-R.F.K. Jr. imbroglio and a CNN shocker.
and…
John Ourand unpacks the NFL’s election bump.
WASHINGTON:
John Heilemann chats about Kamala Harris’s ascent and Donald Trump’s descent with second gentleman Doug Emhoff.
and…
Peter Hamby scrutinizes the Rogan-ization of 2024, and Tara Palmeri gathers the tea from Mar-a-Lago.
meanwhile…
Julia Ioffe chronicles the madness of Ryan Routh’s sojourn to Kyiv.
PODCASTS:
John Ourand and Axios’s Sara Fischer project ESPN’s streaming future on The Varsity.
and…
John Heilemann talks policy with Pete Buttigieg on Impolitic.
and…
Matt and Black List founder Franklin Leonard discuss the complexities of the modern screenwriting business on The Town.
and…
Tara and Meghan McCain chat about Laura Loomer’s relationship to Trumpworld on Somebody’s Gotta Win.
and…
Lauren talks finance bro looks with Industry creators Konrad Kay and Mickey Down, plus costume designer Laura Smith, on Fashion People.
and…
Bill and Peter chew over Wall Street’s October surprise on The Powers That Be.
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| On Wednesday morning, I was sitting down to edit the latest draft of Line Sheet, Lauren Sherman’s peerless private email on the fashion and beauty industries, when I saw a series of texts bubble up on my phone. As a matter of habit and preference, I turn my iPhone upside down and disable messages when I’m trying to really concentrate—edit a story, work on a presentation, review financial or legal documents, write this weekly letter, or clean out my inbox, etcetera. But this was a particularly busy morning—John Heilemann had just published his interview with second gentleman Doug Emhoff, and another news organization was trying to scoop Rachel Strugatz’s story about Glossier’s new strategy, among other things—so I yielded to the moment and left my phone face-up on the desk, so that I could multitask away.
The inbound, from sports executives and media people, pertained to a new report that ESPN scoop machine Adrian Wojnarowski, a.k.a. Woj, was stepping down from the network—retiring from the news industry, in fact—to take a role at his alma mater, St. Bonaventure. Of course, grizzled media people, whose resting state is a fertile brew of cynicism and suspicion, simply couldn’t believe it was all so straightforward. Conditioned by the scandal-plagued #MeToo era and the cancellation politics of the pandemic, many people customarily assume an ulterior motive when a public figure decides to step down voluntarily.
Was there another shoe waiting to drop, they wondered? Woj, after all, would be saying goodbye to a $7 million-per-year contract in exchange for the domestic bliss of unlimited family time. Yes, the guy worked around the clock, constantly breaking news about NBA free agency signings or personnel moves, but that seemed like a lot of money to walk away from.
In this instance, I remarked at my good fortune: I knew a couple people who could find out. I immediately pinged my partner Dylan Byers and asked him if he would investigate the situation. In the Room, his industry-defining private email on the media business, was set to ship that evening. Dylan was already busy at work on a piece about the familiar terrain of cable news that I was excited to sink my teeth into. But the literal “Woj bomb,” and all the attendant speculation, seemed worthy of a quick course correction. Dylan pinged me right back to declare that he was on the case.
The resulting piece, Woj’s Own Woj Bomb, is a revelation of an unusual variety. Indeed, Woj was stepping down on his own terms—the guy was burned out, simply put, and sick of living on his phone—but his departure also marked the end of an era in the media business. Woj, of course, had ascended to the higher calling of scoopdom when the internet was displacing traditional analog news sources and television as a source of quick-hitting information. His breaking-news tweets about the NBA could redirect millions of eyeballs to ESPN’s owned and operated properties—its website, app, and, of course, television network.
Alas, that’s an increasingly anachronistic value structure. ESPN’s economic future now hinges far less on its web properties or TV channels than its forthcoming flagship direct-to-consumer streaming app. The success of the streamer will determine everything from whether chairman Jimmy Pitaro is a rightful heir to Bob Iger, to the fates of rival services. Woj’s value looks a little different in this near and uncertain future. It’s hard to imagine someone signing up for the flagship service due to a tweet about a Knicks roster move. And while this equation might not have motivated Woj to leave, it partly explains why ESPN didn’t back up the Brink’s truck, as it did to retain Pat McAfee, and surely will for Stephen A. Smith.
On a fundamental level, the molecular units of media are changing before our eyes. As a kid, I listened to music on cassette and CD. Then Napster came along and deconstructed the album into nonsequential, streamable singles. I was weaned on network television and basic cable. Now, the very concept of a 24/7 network seems foolish and wasteful. Streaming reprogrammed our expectations to be about individual, asynchronous shows and movies. Increasingly, magazines and newspapers are being reduced to what fits in an email—a phenomenon I know you are well acquainted with by now. The story of how ESPN retrofits its content for a modern platform is the leitmotif of Dylan’s piece. It is, after all, the story of our time and industry, and precisely what you should expect from Puck.
Have a great weekend,
Jon |
