Happy new year! Here's what's happening: Rickey Gervais on why he's returning to host the Golden Globes, THR critics on who will win and who should win, the Globes goes vegan, digital game spending hits a new record, the top media and entertainment stocks for 2020. Plus: Remembering the NBA's David Stern, and the one where Friends stops streaming (for now). --Alex Weprin
[The Hollywood Reporter](
[The Hollywood Reporter](
Today In Entertainment
JANUARY 02, 2020
Happy new year! Here's what's happening: Rickey Gervais on why he's returning to host the Golden Globes, THR critics on who will win and who should win, the Globes goes vegan, digital game spending hits a new record, the top media and entertainment stocks for 2020. Plus: Remembering the NBA's David Stern, and the one where Friends stops streaming (for now). --Alex Weprin
Happy new year! Here's what's happening: Rickey Gervais on why he's returning to host the Golden Globes, THR critics on who will win and who should win, the Globes goes vegan, digital game spending hits a new record, the top media and entertainment stocks for 2020. Plus: Remembering the NBA's David Stern, and the one where Friends stops streaming (for now). --Alex Weprin
Ricky New Year
[On the cover](: Ricky Gervais, who will host the Golden Globes for the fifth time this Sunday, speaks with Piya Sinha-Roy at his home in London about why he's returning, those controversial tweets, his 'Office' money and the jokes he can't tell in 2020: "Nowadays, you've got to make sure they're bulletproof."
Q: Why host the Globes again?
Gervais: "Because it's fun, it's fun! That first time I did it, [I thought], "Do I pander to the 200 privileged egos in the room, or do I try and entertain a global audience of 200 million people sitting at home who aren't winning awards?" Well, no contest. I try and make it a spectator sport. I try and play the outsider. It would be nauseating for me to come out and go, "Hey, George, how you doing, thanks for letting me use your villa. Hey, Brad, see you tonight, yeah?" It's horrible. I've got to be the bloke sitting at home who shouldn't have been invited. That's who I've got to be."
Q: Just curious, do they pay a lot of money for hosting the Globes?
Gervais: "Yeah, of course, but that's not why I do it. I've got enough f*cking money. I said to my agent, 'I won't do for money anything I wouldn't do for free.' He went, 'Please don't say that ever again.'"
Q: You emailed Ted Sarandos at Netflix back in 2012, 2013 —
Gervais: "I think I might have heard that their first project was a remake of House of Cards. I got his email and I said 'Hi, I think Netflix is the future. I want to do my next project with you.' He sent back, 'We'll take it.' That's amazing, isn't it? You're basically talking to the head of a studio and he goes, 'We’ll take it.'" [The cover story](.
+Golden Globes: Who will win, and sho should win. In the film categories THR chief film critic Todd McCarthy makes his case while awards analyst Scott Feinberg calculates the odds as both agree that The Irishman and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood should expect to take home awards Sunday night. [The full film list](. In the TV categories, THR chief TV critic Daniel Fienberg reveals his picks (from Succession to Fleabag) asâ¯Feinberg makes his predictions (The Crown and, yes, Fleabag could feel the HFPA love). [The full TV list](.
+Also: The Globes goes vegan. The Golden Globes is 86’ing the awards-circuit chicken dinner. As part of its sustainability efforts, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association will be serving a plant-based meal at the Golden Globes on Jan. 5, making it likely the first major awards show to go all-vegan. The menu is a last-minute change from a menu that was previewed in December that included fish. [More](.
+Sidenote: The Golden Globes mark the first major NBC TV event for new NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell, who assumed the role yesterday, reporting to outgoing NBCU CEO Steve Burke. Burke, who has shifted to a chairman role, will retire from the company after the Tokyo Olympics, at which point Shell will report to Comcast CEO Brian Roberts.
Ricky New Year
[On the cover](: Ricky Gervais, who will host the Golden Globes for the fifth time this Sunday, speaks with Piya Sinha-Roy at his home in London about why he's returning, those controversial tweets, his 'Office' money and the jokes he can't tell in 2020: "Nowadays, you've got to make sure they're bulletproof."
Q: Why host the Globes again?
Gervais: "Because it's fun, it's fun! That first time I did it, [I thought], "Do I pander to the 200 privileged egos in the room, or do I try and entertain a global audience of 200 million people sitting at home who aren't winning awards?" Well, no contest. I try and make it a spectator sport. I try and play the outsider. It would be nauseating for me to come out and go, "Hey, George, how you doing, thanks for letting me use your villa. Hey, Brad, see you tonight, yeah?" It's horrible. I've got to be the bloke sitting at home who shouldn't have been invited. That's who I've got to be."
Q: Just curious, do they pay a lot of money for hosting the Globes?
Gervais: "Yeah, of course, but that's not why I do it. I've got enough f*cking money. I said to my agent, 'I won't do for money anything I wouldn't do for free.' He went, 'Please don't say that ever again.'"
Q: You emailed Ted Sarandos at Netflix back in 2012, 2013 —
Gervais: "I think I might have heard that their first project was a remake of House of Cards. I got his email and I said 'Hi, I think Netflix is the future. I want to do my next project with you.' He sent back, 'We'll take it.' That's amazing, isn't it? You're basically talking to the head of a studio and he goes, 'We’ll take it.'" [The cover story](.
+Golden Globes: Who will win, and sho should win. In the film categories THR chief film critic Todd McCarthy makes his case while awards analyst Scott Feinberg calculates the odds as both agree that The Irishman and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood should expect to take home awards Sunday night. [The full film list](. In the TV categories, THR chief TV critic Daniel Fienberg reveals his picks (from Succession to Fleabag) asâ¯Feinberg makes his predictions (The Crown and, yes, Fleabag could feel the HFPA love). [The full TV list](.
+Also: The Globes goes vegan. The Golden Globes is 86’ing the awards-circuit chicken dinner. As part of its sustainability efforts, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association will be serving a plant-based meal at the Golden Globes on Jan. 5, making it likely the first major awards show to go all-vegan. The menu is a last-minute change from a menu that was previewed in December that included fish. [More](.
+Sidenote: The Golden Globes mark the first major NBC TV event for new NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell, who assumed the role yesterday, reporting to outgoing NBCU CEO Steve Burke. Burke, who has shifted to a chairman role, will retire from the company after the Tokyo Olympics, at which point Shell will report to Comcast CEO Brian Roberts.
['Fortnite' Helps Drive Gaming Revenue Record]
'Fortnite' Helps Drive Gaming Revenue Record
âºGlobal digital game spending hits record $109 billion in 2019. Global spending on digital games hit a new high in 2019 as Nielsen's SuperData Research Group has revealed the industry generated more than $109.4 billion this year, up three percent from 2018's $106.1 billion. The year's top-earning title overall was once again Epic Game's Fortnite, which generated $1.8 billion in 2019. The game — which first launched in 2017 and is free to download across consoles, PC and mobile platforms — brought in $2.4 billion last year. [The numbers](.
In other business news...
âºViacomCBS, WWE and Roku are among Wall Street's stock picks for 2020. Amid the streaming wars, set to kick into a higher gear with the spring launches of Comcast/NBCUniversal's Peacock and AT&T/WarnerMedia's HBO Max, continued cord-cutting and debate about how TV advertising trends will shape up beyond the Summer Olympics and elections, analysts' picks are varied as in most years. [More](.
+Why Canadian entertainment companies put "for sale" signs up in 2019. The bottom line on the recent spate of dealmaking for Canadian sector companies is that buyers have been strategic and opportunistic as they pursue corporate strategies. A banker tells THR that in many cases the takeover targets being Canadian may have not been the driving factor for buyers, but the Canadian targets fit their strategic needs and were open to selling to a bigger acquirer. [The story](.
+The one where Friends disappears from streaming (for now). The classic sitcom, which has called Netflix its streaming home for the last five years, is no longer available on the service as of yesterday, Jan. 1. It won’t return to streaming until the May launch of HBO Max. Natalie Jarvey has [the backstory](.
+Theater chains' stock hammered since the debut of Cats, Star Wars. In the 11 days since they opened, shares of AMC Entertainment and Imax are each down 7 percent while Cinemark is off 4 percent. IPic, the luxury chain that offers comfortable seating, alcoholic beverages and other amenities, wasn't around long enough to feel the impact of the the pair of movies, as it filed for bankruptcy protection in August and was delisted from trading. [The story](.
Elsewhere in film...
--How Peanut Butter Falcon star [helped change]( Shia LaBeouf's life.
--How Dark Fate's visual effects team [brought Terminator stars](back to the '90s.
--Here's Heat Vision's list of the top 10 movies of 2019. [The list](.
--Star Wars star Kelly Marie Tran [on the challenge]( of shooting Leia's scenes.
--The [first trailer]( for John Krasinski's A Quiet Place: Part II is here, and it aims to make some noise. Also: Richard Newby [writes about]("the mysteries of the Quiet Place Part II trailer."
'Fortnite' Helps Drive Gaming Revenue Record
âºGlobal digital game spending hits record $109 billion in 2019. Global spending on digital games hit a new high in 2019 as Nielsen's SuperData Research Group has revealed the industry generated more than $109.4 billion this year, up three percent from 2018's $106.1 billion. The year's top-earning title overall was once again Epic Game's Fortnite, which generated $1.8 billion in 2019. The game — which first launched in 2017 and is free to download across consoles, PC and mobile platforms — brought in $2.4 billion last year. [The numbers](.
In other business news...
âºViacomCBS, WWE and Roku are among Wall Street's stock picks for 2020. Amid the streaming wars, set to kick into a higher gear with the spring launches of Comcast/NBCUniversal's Peacock and AT&T/WarnerMedia's HBO Max, continued cord-cutting and debate about how TV advertising trends will shape up beyond the Summer Olympics and elections, analysts' picks are varied as in most years. [More](.
+Why Canadian entertainment companies put "for sale" signs up in 2019. The bottom line on the recent spate of dealmaking for Canadian sector companies is that buyers have been strategic and opportunistic as they pursue corporate strategies. A banker tells THR that in many cases the takeover targets being Canadian may have not been the driving factor for buyers, but the Canadian targets fit their strategic needs and were open to selling to a bigger acquirer. [The story](.
+The one where Friends disappears from streaming (for now). The classic sitcom, which has called Netflix its streaming home for the last five years, is no longer available on the service as of yesterday, Jan. 1. It won’t return to streaming until the May launch of HBO Max. Natalie Jarvey has [the backstory](.
+Theater chains' stock hammered since the debut of Cats, Star Wars. In the 11 days since they opened, shares of AMC Entertainment and Imax are each down 7 percent while Cinemark is off 4 percent. IPic, the luxury chain that offers comfortable seating, alcoholic beverages and other amenities, wasn't around long enough to feel the impact of the the pair of movies, as it filed for bankruptcy protection in August and was delisted from trading. [The story](.
Elsewhere in film...
--How Peanut Butter Falcon star [helped change]( Shia LaBeouf's life.
--How Dark Fate's visual effects team [brought Terminator stars](back to the '90s.
--Here's Heat Vision's list of the top 10 movies of 2019. [The list](.
--Star Wars star Kelly Marie Tran [on the challenge]( of shooting Leia's scenes.
--The [first trailer]( for John Krasinski's A Quiet Place: Part II is here, and it aims to make some noise. Also: Richard Newby [writes about]("the mysteries of the Quiet Place Part II trailer."
[David Stern, 1942-2020]
David Stern, 1942-2020
âºDavid Stern, former NBA commissioner, dies at 77. Stern, the basketball-loving lawyer who took the NBA around the world during 30 years as its longest-serving commissioner and oversaw its growth into a global powerhouse, died Wednesday. He was 77. Stern suffered a brain hemorrhage on Dec. 12 and underwent emergency surgery. The league said he died with his wife, Dianne, and their family at his bedside. [The obituary](.
+Stern's TV legacy. Stern was one of the most important figures in the world of television in recent memory. He helped make live sports the must-see TV event it remains, and turned around the NBA in the process. According to ESPN, when Stern became NBA commissioner in 1984, the league's TV revenue was $10 million. When he stepped down in 2014, it was more than $900 million.
The mysterious sexual assault lawsuit brought by an anonymous massage therapist against Kevin Spacey is ending, according to papers filed in federal court Monday. Attorneys for Spacey and the special administrator filed a stipulation to dismiss the case with prejudice (meaning claims can't be refiled). No terms of the deal were made public. [The story](.
+Also: Nearly a dozen documentaries about music legends including The Rolling Stones, U2 and Elton John "are nothing more than a delivery system for intentionally infringed materials," according to a new lawsuit.[More](.
+And: An actress who had a small role in the 2011 movie Captain America: The First Avenger is accused of fatally stabbing her mother inside a suburban Kansas City home. [More](.
âºFox carriage crisis averted. Fox Corp. and the National Cable Television Cooperative were able to strike a new carriage deal just as the outgoing deal was set to expire, ensuring that Fox News, Fox Sports and some local stations remain available in the NCTC's eight million subscriber footprint. Terms of the deal weren't disclosed, but a Fox spokesperson said "all of the NCTC’s members will continue to carry our portfolio of leading sports, entertainment and news programming for years to come.”
Elsewhere in TV...
--Surviving R. Kelly bosses say Part 2 is [for the survivors](: "We had a sense of responsibility."
--Justin Bieber is returning to his roots. YouTube, the platform where Bieber got his start, [has ordered]( a docuseries about the pop star called Justin Bieber: Seasons.
--Daniel Fienberg reviews the [Netflix drama Messiah](.
--Robyn Bahr reviews [Netflix's Spinning Out](.
^A close read on the 2019 digital video landscape. To help the industry to better understand the changes to the digital landscape, THR teamed with the media measurement and analytics company Comscore. Using Comscore’s March-April 2019 State of Digital Services report, THR created custom analysis and a deeper dive into the digital video category and the generational variations that currently exist. [Read More](.
Obituaries: [Jack Sheldon](, the extraordinary West Coast jazz trumpeter and singer who played "The Shadow of Your Smile" for the big screen, served as Merv Griffin's sidekick and voiced characters on Schoolhouse Rock!, died Friday, his longtime manager, Dianne Jimenez, reported. He was 88... [Sonny Mehta](, the urbane and astute head of Alfred A. Knopf who guided one of the book world's most esteemed imprints to new heights through a blend of prize-winning literature by Toni Morrison and Cormac McCarthy among others and blockbusters such as Fifty Shades of Grey and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, has died at age 77...
What else we're reading...
--"Martin Scorsese is letting go" [[NY Times](]
--"The profound legacy of David Stern, the NBA’s most consequential off-court force" [[The Ringer](]
--"Meet the wannabe kidfluencers struggling for stardom" [[MIT Technology Review](]
Today's birthdays: Ben Hardy, 29, Christy Turlington, 51, Cuba Gooding Jr., 52, Dax Shepard, 45, Gabrielle Carteris, 59, Kate Bosworth, 37, Taye Diggs, 49.
David Stern, 1942-2020
âºDavid Stern, former NBA commissioner, dies at 77. Stern, the basketball-loving lawyer who took the NBA around the world during 30 years as its longest-serving commissioner and oversaw its growth into a global powerhouse, died Wednesday. He was 77. Stern suffered a brain hemorrhage on Dec. 12 and underwent emergency surgery. The league said he died with his wife, Dianne, and their family at his bedside. [The obituary](.
+Stern's TV legacy. Stern was one of the most important figures in the world of television in recent memory. He helped make live sports the must-see TV event it remains, and turned around the NBA in the process. According to ESPN, when Stern became NBA commissioner in 1984, the league's TV revenue was $10 million. When he stepped down in 2014, it was more than $900 million.
The mysterious sexual assault lawsuit brought by an anonymous massage therapist against Kevin Spacey is ending, according to papers filed in federal court Monday. Attorneys for Spacey and the special administrator filed a stipulation to dismiss the case with prejudice (meaning claims can't be refiled). No terms of the deal were made public. [The story](.
+Also: Nearly a dozen documentaries about music legends including The Rolling Stones, U2 and Elton John "are nothing more than a delivery system for intentionally infringed materials," according to a new lawsuit.[More](.
+And: An actress who had a small role in the 2011 movie Captain America: The First Avenger is accused of fatally stabbing her mother inside a suburban Kansas City home. [More](.
âºFox carriage crisis averted. Fox Corp. and the National Cable Television Cooperative were able to strike a new carriage deal just as the outgoing deal was set to expire, ensuring that Fox News, Fox Sports and some local stations remain available in the NCTC's eight million subscriber footprint. Terms of the deal weren't disclosed, but a Fox spokesperson said "all of the NCTC’s members will continue to carry our portfolio of leading sports, entertainment and news programming for years to come.”
Elsewhere in TV...
--Surviving R. Kelly bosses say Part 2 is [for the survivors](: "We had a sense of responsibility."
--Justin Bieber is returning to his roots. YouTube, the platform where Bieber got his start, [has ordered]( a docuseries about the pop star called Justin Bieber: Seasons.
--Daniel Fienberg reviews the [Netflix drama Messiah](.
--Robyn Bahr reviews [Netflix's Spinning Out](.
^A close read on the 2019 digital video landscape. To help the industry to better understand the changes to the digital landscape, THR teamed with the media measurement and analytics company Comscore. Using Comscore’s March-April 2019 State of Digital Services report, THR created custom analysis and a deeper dive into the digital video category and the generational variations that currently exist. [Read More](.
Obituaries: [Jack Sheldon](, the extraordinary West Coast jazz trumpeter and singer who played "The Shadow of Your Smile" for the big screen, served as Merv Griffin's sidekick and voiced characters on Schoolhouse Rock!, died Friday, his longtime manager, Dianne Jimenez, reported. He was 88... [Sonny Mehta](, the urbane and astute head of Alfred A. Knopf who guided one of the book world's most esteemed imprints to new heights through a blend of prize-winning literature by Toni Morrison and Cormac McCarthy among others and blockbusters such as Fifty Shades of Grey and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, has died at age 77...
What else we're reading...
--"Martin Scorsese is letting go" [[NY Times](]
--"The profound legacy of David Stern, the NBA’s most consequential off-court force" [[The Ringer](]
--"Meet the wannabe kidfluencers struggling for stardom" [[MIT Technology Review](]
Today's birthdays: Ben Hardy, 29, Christy Turlington, 51, Cuba Gooding Jr., 52, Dax Shepard, 45, Gabrielle Carteris, 59, Kate Bosworth, 37, Taye Diggs, 49.
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JANUARY 02, 2020
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