Lupita Nyong'o on 'Black Panther 2,' the Weight of Stardom; Netflix Adds 2.4M Subs; NFL Adds Black Friday Game on Amazon; THR's Power Business Managers 2022; 'Black Adam' Review

[View on web]( [New reader? Subscribe]( October 19, 2022 What's news: It's magazine day! This week's cover star is the endlessly fascinating Lupita Nyong'o. Netflix's subscriber base is growing again, but the company wants to focus on revenue going forward. Meghan Markle has revealed why she quit NBC's Deal or No Deal. Rick Riordan is writing another Percy Jackson book. Lionsgate/Roadside have snapped up Ray Romano's Somewhere in Queens. — [Abid Rahman]( Lupita Nyong'o on 'Black Panther 2,' the Weight of Stardom ►On the cover. Lupita Nyong'o is known as a serious and committed actress, and she is undoubtedly that, but she’s also, as fewer people know, playful and self-deprecating. The famously private actress opens up to THR's [Rebecca Keegan]( about the hard-but-healing process of making Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the year's most anticipated Marvel sequel — while still mourning Chadwick Boseman — and her ambivalence personifying Black beauty. [The cover story.]( Netflix's Data Vault Cracks Open a Little ►"Audience measurement is incredibly important to advertisers." As Netflix launches its ad effort, the company will engage Nielsen in the U.S. and BARB in the U.K. THR's [Alex Weprin]( writes that the streamer's willingness to cut deals with third-party measurement and verification companies for its ad-tier service could pave the way to evolving its business model — and relinquishing more viewership numbers. [The analysis.]( —Growing again. Netflix added 2.4m subscribers during Q3, marking a major turnaround for the streaming giant that has been plagued by declining growth during the past year. Netflix is now projecting to add another 4.5m subscribers during Q4. In the U.S. and Canada, Netflix saw a modest gain of 100,000 subscribers, while the Asia Pacific region contributed 1.4m paying subscribers. Latin America brought in 310,000 subs, and the EMEA region drove 570,000 of Netflix’s quarterly subscriber adds. [The results.]( —It's the revenue, stupid. Netflix will no longer be providing forecasts for its subscriber numbers, as the streamer moves toward a greater focus on revenue. The streaming giant, which hit 223m global paid subscribers, said it will stop sharing paid sub guidance beginning next quarter. [The story.]( —Peeling back Glass Onion. In a first, the country’s three largest theater circuits have all agreed to carry a Netflix's hotly anticipated feature Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. THR's [Pamela McClintock]( writes the move comes despite the streamer’s ongoing policy of not reporting grosses, resulting in an unusual Thanksgiving recipe. [The analysis.]( —"There’s no one telling these stories. And these stories need to be told." THR's [Etan Vlessing]( has the scoop on Netflix giving Anishinaabe filmmaker Jaime Wescoup $25,000 in film development financing to mark the streamer passing the milestone of 1,000 creators completing Netflix-supported film training programs in Canada. [The story.]( WBD Grapples With Cost of Cutting Pipeline Programs ►Program-paid or show-paid. The shuttering of Warner Bros. TV Group's long-running writers and directors workshops earlier this month sparked backlash among the vocal community of writers on social media. Less than 24 hours later, WBD announced the workshops were in fact moving under the jurisdiction of the company’s DEI unit. As the conglomerate shuffles the workshops onto corporate ledgers, THR's diversity and inclusion editor [Rebecca Sun]( reports insiders are weighing which kind of funding provides the better DEI fix. [The story.]( —Nominative determinism. The British Academy has selected Winners, the Farsi-language drama from British-Iranian writer and director Hassan Nazer, as the U.K.’s submission for next year’s international feature award at the Oscars. Set in a poor village, Winners follows 9-year-old Yahya and his friend Leyla, who one day find a precious statuette in the desert. The film was shot entirely in Iran with 100 percent Farsi dialogue and was post-produced in Scotland. [The story.]( —"The wait is over, demigods." Author Rick Riordan has revealed that there'll be a sixth installment in his popular children’s book franchise Percy Jackson, 14 years after the release of the fifth book in the series, Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Last Olympian. The news of the book, titled The Chalice of the Gods, comes a few months after a Disney+ series based on the first book, Percy Jackson and the Olympians, began production. [The story.]( —"We were even given spray-tan vouchers each week." Meghan Markle has revealed why she decided to quit the NBC game show Deal or No Deal. In the most recent episode of the Duchess of Sussex’s Archetypes podcast, the Suits alum recalled feeling "forced to be all looks and little substance" during her 34-episode stint as a model on Deal or No Deal that began in 2006. [The story.]( —"False and hurtful information." Drink Champs, the podcast hosted by N.O.R.E. and DJ EFN, has taken down a recent episode featuring Kanye “Ye” West, due to the rapper’s comments about the murder of George Floyd. During his three-hour appearance, West spread misinformation about Floyd's death and repeated antisemitic conspiracy theories. [The story.]( NFL Adds Black Friday Game on Amazon ►It's happening. The NFL’s Thanksgiving weekend is getting a little longer. Starting in 2023, the league will add a game on the day after Thanksgiving that will stream on Amazon’s Prime Video, thus drawing millions of viewers into the ecommerce giant’s realm on the biggest shopping day of the year. The deal adds another NFL window for the streamer, which took over the Thursday Night Football franchise this year. [The story.]( —"It’s a different business than it was four years ago." In part two of [Lesley Goldberg]( interview with Bob Greenblatt, the former WarnerMedia, NBC and Showtime exec, opens up about the state of the industry and what’s next: "It’s tumultuous and chaotic." [The interview.]( —Snapped up. Lionsgate and Roadside Attractions have acquired Somewhere in Queens, Ray Romano’s debut feature as a director that bowed at the Tribeca Film Festival. Roadside plans a theatrical release in 2023 for the comic drama that Romano stars in, co-wrote with Mark Stegemann and also produced. [The story.]( —"In my heart, I did not believe this had happened." During cross-examination at the ongoing civil sex abuse trial, Kevin Spacey repeatedly rejected suggestions that he wasn’t telling the truth when he denied Anthony Rapp's claims that he made a sexual advance on him when he was 14 in the 1980s. Spacey admitted entertaining Rapp and Rapp’s friend, a then 19-year-old John Barrowman, one evening in 1986. But he said if he had a romantic interest, it was Barrowman, not Rapp. [The story.]( —Convicted. Actor and rapper Kaalan 'KR' Walker has been sentenced to 50 years to life in prison for his conviction for raping aspiring models he met online. Walker, who starred in the 2018 remake of the movie Superfly and also appeared in the 2017 film Kings, was sentenced Monday in Superior Court in Los Angeles following his April conviction. [The story.]( THR's Power Business Managers 2022 ►A-list help. From making smart choices in the stock market to building a business empire, THR's annual list of Power Business Managers highlights the people keeping finances on track for the entertainment elite. [The list.]( —The rock star business manager. Richard Feldstein, THR's 2022 Business Manager Icon, reflects on nearly 50 years in the industry repping clients like Adam Levine and Kate Hudson — and that time he took a red-eye to get a band out of IRS trouble. [The story.]( Film Review: 'Black Adam' ►"A magnetic antihero, but muddled political undertones." THR film critic John DeFore reviews Jaume Collet-Serra's Black Adam. Dwayne Johnson brings Shazam's maybe-nemesis to the screen in Collet-Serra's DC debut, co-starring Aldis Hodge and Pierce Brosnan. [The review.]( —"Fail." THR's chief film critic [David Rooney]( reviews Paul Feig's The School for Good and Evil. Sophia Anne Caruso and Sofia Wylie play new students at a prep school for fairy tale heroes and villains whose faculty includes Charlize Theron, Kerry Washington, Michelle Yeoh and Laurence Fishburne. [The review.]( In other news... —First [Creed III trailer pits Michael B. Jordan against Jonathan Majors]( —Damien Chazelle‘s [Babylon moves up nationwide release to Christmas]( —Audie Cornish’s [CNN podcast to premiere next month]( —TV ratings: [Chicago Fire rises high in seven-day chart]( —Sam Mendes [to be honored at 2022 Camerimage Festival]( —TCM Classic Film Festival [sets 2023 dates]( —TikTok’s [head of content partnerships leaves for Spotify]( —WBD's [Renard T. Jenkins elected president of SMPTE Engineering Society]( What else we're reading... —In a fascinating excerpt from his book Waxing On: The Karate Kid And Me, Ralph Macchio reveals that much of 80s culture passed him by as he was "way-way inside of it" to even notice [[Vulture]( —Former Academy exec Bruce Davis pens a guest column on why the Oscars might be doomed [[Daily Beast]( —Joe Coscarelli looks at how Atlanta's history has shaped its music ecosystem as well as a whole generation of leading rappers like Lil Baby, Migos, Future and 21 Savage [[NYT]( —Makena Kelly digs into the reasons behind Kanye West's purchase of Parler, and reports that Parlement Technologies has been trying to offload the social media platform for a long time [[Verge]( —Beatrice Nolan reports that AI image generators are copying artists' style and making thousands of images, and the original creators are completely powerless to do anything about it [[Insider]( Today... ...in 1979, Columbia unveiled the R-rated legal drama …And Justice for All in theaters. The film went on to earn two Oscar nominations at the 52nd Academy Awards, for its screenplay and for Al Pacino in the lead actor category. [The story.]( Today's birthdays: Rebecca Ferguson (39), Trey Parker (53), [John Lithgow]( (77), Gillian Jacobs (40), Jon Favreau (56), Hunter King (29), Michael Gambon (82), Katja Herbers (42), Desmond Harrington (46), Parveen Kaur (34), Chris Kattan (52), Jason Reitman (45), Silje Torp (48), Art Parkinson (21), Annie Golden (71), William O'Leary (65), Omar Gooding (46), Yayan Ruhian (54), Sunny Deol (65), Oh Yeong-su (78) Do you have THR's next big story? Confidentially share tips with us at [tips@thr.com](mailto:tips@thr.com?subject=) This email was sent to {EMAIL} by Penske Media Corporation. Please add email@email.hollywoodreporter.com to your address book to ensure delivery to your inbox. Visit the [Preferences Center]( to update your profile and customize what email alerts and newsletters you receive. 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