Welcome back to What I’m Hearing...

Another Sunday night, another new week. I’ll be at the Cinemacon movie theater conference in Las Vegas for a couple days; hit me up if you want to get coffee or play high-stakes blackjack with your corporate card. And in advance, I’ve got a very theater-centric analysis today…

Discussed in this issue: Reed Hastings, Gunnar Wiedenfels, Kelly Bush, Toby Emmerich, Adam Aron, Michael Keaton, Bob Chapek, Todd Boehly, Paul Haggis, David Herrin, and the cringiest of publicist profiles…

Who Won the Week: Michael Nathanson

The media analyst and longtime Netflix bear was finally vindicated by the stock selloff and Wall Street’s about-face on streaming. Now he (and everyone else) is trying to figure out how the new advertising business will work.   

A little more on the Netflix correction and the impact around Hollywood…

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Have Movie Theaters Gotten Their Mojo Back?

The Great Netflix Correction is forcing Hollywood to rethink the “all-in” strategy for streaming. It’s not nearly a full reversal of fortunes, but it’s definitely a vibe shift. Consider the debate over Batgirl.

There’s an interesting debate going on at Warner Bros. right now. They’ve got Batgirl, a $70 million-ish film that just finished shooting, and the plan under former WarnerMedia C.E.O. Jason Kilar was to release it directly on HBO Max. Kilar’s singular mission, as anyone who walked the lot with him knows, was to build up the streaming service to compete with Netflix, the north star of the entertainment industry, even if it meant shrinking—sorry, evolving—the century-old theatrical business. So debuting on HBO Max a mid-budget DC movie, one based on a known but untested character who already stars in a TV show, made perfect sense.

But maybe, Toby Emmerich and his Warners team are thinking, now is the time to invest a bit more money into Batgirl, perhaps up the visual effects and the music budget and the planned marketing spend, and give the movie a theatrical run first? After all, it’s a new day under Warner Bros. Discovery C.E.O. David Zaslav. The Batman, admittedly the company’s marquee superhero property, is putting up huge numbers on Max, I’m told, even after generating $750 million in theaters over 45 days (or, perhaps, because it generated those numbers). And, more importantly, the Great Netflix Correction of ‘22 is causing Warners and all of Hollywood to rethink the “all-in” strategy for streaming...

FOUR STORIES WE'RE TALKING ABOUT