Disney Layoffs Begin; 'John Wick 5' Back on the Table; Paramount's Chris McCarthy Talks Showtime and Spinoffs; Matthew Macfadyen Looks to Life After 'Succession'

[View on web]( [New reader? Subscribe]( March 28, 2023 What's news: Questlove will direct a live-action remake of Disney's The Aristocats. Jessica Chastain will headline Apple's The Savant. Liv Tyler is returning to the MCU. A Scatman John biopic is in the works. Indiana Jones 5 may premiere in Cannes. — [Abid Rahman]( Disney Layoffs Begin ►"I want to acknowledge that there will no doubt be challenges ahead." In a memo to employees Monday, Disney CEO Bob Iger said that the company will see layoffs this week and begin the process of notifying impacted staff, with two more rounds of cuts planned in the next couple of months. Iger said in February that the company would shed 7,000 jobs as the company restructures around three core divisions: Disney Entertainment, ESPN, and Parks, Experiences and Products. [The story.]( —First victims. THR's [Lesley Goldberg]( reports that the cuts in Disney's television divisions have focused on production and acquisitions. Among the notable staffers let go Monday are Jayne Bieber, senior vp production at Freeform/Onyx Collective; Mark Levenstein, head of production and postproduction at Hulu; and Elizabeth Newman, head of Disney’s acquisitions department. Sources note Newman’s entire acquisitions team has been dissolved, while Bieber and Levenstein’s production teams will be folded under Carol Turner, exec vp production at ABC Signature. [The story.]( —Meta no more. More grim news this morning as Disney shuttered its nascent metaverse division as part of Monday’s layoffs. The division (technically called “next generation storytelling”) had been a pet project of Bob Chapek, Disney’s former CEO. [The story.]( —Wait, what? Amid the bad news coming from Disney, the company revealed on Monday that Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson will direct a live-action adaption of the Jazz-focused 1970s animated feature The Aristocats for the studio. In what will be the Oscar and Grammy winner's narrative feature debut, Thompson will also oversee the music for the film, which will have a script by Will Gluck and Keith Bunin. [The story.]( 'John Wick 5' Back on the Table After Box Office Blowup ►"There’s a will and there’s an openness." John Wick: Chapter 4 had widely been expected to be the final installment in the main action franchise, but a fifth installment is back on the table after the movie’s astonishing opening at the global box office, according to Lionsgate motion picture group chair Joe Drake. THR's [Pamela McClintock]( spoke to Drake about the potential for a followup and the ever expanding John Wick universe. [The story.]( —🎭 Predicting good things 🎭 Jessica Chastain is the latest A-lister to score her own show at Apple. Chastain will star in The Savant, an eight-episode limited series based on a true story published by Cosmopolitan. While Apple is remaining mum on details, Andrea Stanley penned a 2019 Cosmo story “Is It Possible to Stop a Mass Shooting Before It Happens?” that detailed a woman known as “The Savant,” an investigator whose job is to take down the U.S.'s most violent men before they can carry out large-scale attacks. [The story.]( —🎭 Familiar face 🎭 Fifteen years after starring in The Incredible Hulk, Liv Tyler is making her return to the MCU. Tyler has joined the cast of Captain America 4, currently titled Captain America: New World Order. She will reprise the role of scientist Betty Ross. Ross is the daughter of General Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross, who was played by the late William Hurt in several films and will now be portrayed by Harrison Ford in the new installment. [The story.]( —🎭 Headey heading west 🎭 Game of Thrones star Lena Headey will star in The Abandons, a western from Sons of Anarchy creator Kurt Sutter. The show, which received a straight-to-series order in October 2022, follows a group of outlier families in 1850s Oregon who “pursue their Manifest Destiny [while] a corrupt force of wealth and power, coveting their land, tries to force them out,” per the show’s description. [The story.]( Studios Get $30M From Streaming Sites Amid Piracy Crackdown ►Significant win. THR's [Winston Cho]( reports that a coalition of top studios have secured a $30m judgment against the operator of the illegal streaming sites AllAccessTV and Quality Restreams. The studios and defendant Dwayne Johnson (no relation to the actor) agreed to resolve the suit in a deal that includes an injunction barring him from continuing to operate any service that allows users to pirate movies. Universal, Disney and Netflix sued Johnson in Dec. 2021. Warner Bros., Paramount and Apple, among others, also joined in the suit. [The story.]( —📅 Mark it down 📅 Apple Original Films has set a fall theatrical release date for Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, the Western crime drama starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Lily Gladstone, which the studio is distributing in partnership with Paramount. The film, which Scorsese and screenwriter Eric Roth adapted from David Grann’s best-selling 2017 non-fiction book, will open limited on Oct. 6, and wide on Oct. 20 before streaming globally on Apple TV+. [The story.]( —Sacré bleu! Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is eyeing a premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. The French fest runs May 16-27, with Dial of Destiny looking at a day two or day three debut. It is a homecoming of sorts for the pulpy hero. Fifteen years ago, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull debuted at the fest, which has been a launching ground for tentpoles in recent years. A year ago Paramount’s Top Gun: Maverick, screened at Cannes. And in 2018, Lucasfilm brought Solo: A Star Wars to the fest. [The story.]( —🏆 "The coolest ideas or moves or choices are the new ones" 🏆 Taylor Swift and Harry Styles were among the big winners at the 2023 iHeartRadio Music Awards Monday night, with Swift taking home song of the year for “Anti-Hero,” and Styles being named artist of the year. Swift also received the Innovator Award for her impact globally to pop culture. [The winners.]( Inside Jonathan Majors' Scrubbed Army Ad Campaign ►On hold. Jonathan Majors’ ad campaign for the U.S. Army, pulled after his Saturday arrest for allegedly assaulting a woman during a domestic dispute and since scrubbed from the organization’s official channels, was no ordinary sequence of commercials. THR's [Gary Baum]( writes that the new recruitment initiative had aimed to enlist Gen Z, for whom “patriotism doesn’t really play.” [The story.]( —"Ski-Ba-Bop-Ba-Dop-Bop!" THR's [Alex Ritman]( has the scoopy-doopy-doop-doop on a Scatman John feature film in the works at Trick Candle Productions. Written by The Goldbergs scribes Stephen Basilone and Annie Mebane, the biopic will chronicle the life of the late John Larkin, who overcame an abusive childhood and bullying that stemmed from being a lifelong stutterer and became an overnight international sensation in his 50s as Scatman John and one of the biggest novelty hits of the 1990s. [The story.]( —Done deal. Universal Television has snagged rights to the latest selection in Today host Jenna Bush Hager’s book club. The studio will develop Diane Marie Brown’s debut novel, Black Candle Women, with Bel-Air showrunner Carla Banks Waddles writing the adaptation. Hager, who has a first-look deal at UTV parent Universal Studio Group via her Thousand Voices banner, will executive produce, as will Jenna Bans (Good Girls) via her Minnesota Logging Company. Waddles and Bans both have overall deals at Universal TV. [The story.]( Paramount's Chris McCarthy on Why Showtime Eulogies Are Premature ►"I often get confused for a creative." In the latest interview in the Table for Two series, THR's [Lacey Rose]( spoke to Chris McCarthy, the fast-rising head of Paramount Media Networks — and now Showtime — who explains how the doubters fuel him, the logic behind his franchise strategy and why he leaves the script reading to his deputies. [The interview.]( —Still got it. Showtime’s Yellowjackets buzzed its way to a series high in viewers for its second season premiere. The Emmy-nominated drama debuted to about 2m viewers across all platforms, a series high for the show and more than double the audience for the series premiere in November 2021. It was also up 40 percent over the first season finale in January 2022. [The ratings.]( —Record start. The final season of Succession began with the HBO show’s biggest first-night audience to date. Sunday’s fourth season premiere drew 2.3m cross-platform viewers, according to Nielsen and first-party streaming data from HBO. That’s the biggest tune-in for the show ever, passing the 1.7m who watched the season three finale in December 2021. [The ratings.]( Matthew Macfadyen Looks to Life After 'Succession' ►"It’s been great therapy." THR's Seija Rankin spoke to Succession star Matthew Macfadyen as he ponders the end of the hit HBO drama. The actor opens up about the final moments on the set of the show and what it was like taking one last lap as Tom Wambsgans. Warning: Spoilers! [The interview.]( —"Just when I thought I couldn't go any lower, enter season four." For THR, Josh Wigler spoke to Jeremy Strong about the final Succession premiere. Strong talks Kendall’s new outlook on life, the darkness still there and the darkness still to come, and the ceremony that marked the end of his time on the show. Warning: Spoilers! [The interview.]( —"I love that it wasn’t broad comedy." THR's [Jackie Strause]( spoke to Shrinking star Christa Miller about the first season finale cliffhanger. The actress, who stars in Apple's grief comedy opposite Jason Segel and is married to co-creator Bill Lawrence, also looks ahead to season two and opens up about how her real marriage inspires her character's arc. Warning: Spoilers! [The interview.]( In other news... —Firefly Lane S2, [part 2 trailer Has Katherine Heigl and Sarah Chalke testing their friendship]( —Saturday Night Live: [All the S48 hosts and musical guests]( —Canneseries: [Sarah Michelle Gellar to receive Icon Award]( —Paramount [names new investor relations chief]( —Snap [hires top ad exec from Microsoft]( —Lukas Gage [confirms relationship with Chris Appleton]( —BTS star [Jung Kook poses shirtless in new Calvin Klein campaign]( —Derek Luke [signs with Gersh]( —Christian Combs [signs with IMG Models]( What else we're reading... —Ed Zitron explains why all the most popular apps, websites and online services are getting noticeably worse, and it's all to do with fad-chasing Big Tech's search for revenue growth [[Insider]( —With Hollywood's obsession with Tolkien's works seemingly never ending, Ben Child wonders why the industry is overlooking the rich myths of Ancient Greece [[Guardian]( —Alex Abad-Santos writes that the fourth season of Netflix's annoyingly addictive Love Is Blind reality show is its villain era [[Vox]( —Josef Adalian analyzes the battle for BET that will pit the likes of Byron Allen, Sean “Diddy” Combs and Tyler Perry against each other in a potential bidding war [[Vulture]( —Chris Stokel-Walker spoke to the guy who created the viral AI image of "Balenciaga Pope," yet another harbinger of the terrible future ahead of us [[BuzzFeed News]( Today... ...in 1963, Alfred Hitchcock premiered his Psycho feature follow-up, The Birds, in New York. [The original review.]( Today's birthdays: Lady Gaga (37), [Julia Stiles]( (42), Vince Vaughn (53), Reba McEntire (68), Richard Kelly (48), Mike Newell (81), Richard Eyre (80), Jonathan Van Ness (36), Alexandra Billings (61), Orla Brady (62), Dianne Wiest (75), Albert S. Ruddy (93), Flula Borg (41), Nick Frost (51), Laura Harrier (33), Megan Suri (24), Stephen Ure (65), Theo Germaine (31), Ian Ousley (21), Luke Roessler (16), Erica Oyama (42), Natalie Lander (40), Nick Fink (32), Orfeh (52) Royal Blakeman, a president of the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in the 1960s, died Sunday in Delray Beach, Florida. He was 99. [The obituary.]( 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. 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