Shari’s Plan B & ‘Third Newsroom’ Antecedents

Welcome back to Dry Powder. For those who think the Paramount deal process is dead, think again! In today’s issue, a close look at the boomeranging Sony/Apollo offer, the rumored $2.5 billion bid from Bain Capital and Edgar Bronfman Jr., the ostensible $3 billion bid from Hollywood filmmaker Steven Paul, and more.
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Welcome back to Dry Powder. I’m Bill Cohan.

For those who think the Paramount deal process is dead, think again! In today’s issue, a close look at the boomeranging Sony/Apollo offer, the rumored $2.5 billion bid from Bain Capital and Edgar Bronfman Jr., the ostensible $3 billion bid from Hollywood filmmaker Steven Paul, and more.

But first… a few updates from my partners on developments elsewhere in the Puck cinematic universe…

Christie’s to sell some cool stuff that Paul Allen owned: Christie’s announced today that they would continue their relationship with Paul G. Allen’s estate by holding two online auctions and one live sale in early September. The works on offer range from a Gemini spacesuit (estimated at $80,000) to a signed letter from...

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Bezos’ Rubber Room & Shari’s Plan B

News and notes on the dual obsessions of the Sconset set: whether Shari will reconsider the private equity pill and break up Paramount; and how Jeff Bezos and Will Lewis may be taking a page from Wall Street’s layoff playbook with their plan for a “third newsroom” at The Washington Post.

WILLIAM D. COHAN

We’ve entered the perfect deal dynamic for the partnership between Apollo and Sony to pounce on Paramount Global. To nearly everyone’s surprise, two weeks ago, Shari Redstone, the company’s controlling shareholder, blew up the long-anticipated deal that her advisors, and the special committee of the board of directors, had negotiated with David Ellison and RedBird Capital. As my faithful readers know, Ellison and RedBird were going to buy National Amusements Inc., the Redstone family holding company that controls Paramount Global, and then merge Ellison’s Skydance Media into Paramount, with the combined company remaining a publicly traded entity. It was a complicated, creative deal that was on the 1-yard line before Shari...

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