The Press Box - The Trump Trials and the Starless GOP Debate. Plus, Matt Belloni on Disney and the Strikes.

Episode Date: August 4, 2023

Bryan is back with a new segment, Weekend Headlines, where he shares three stories that will get you through the weekend. Then, Matt Belloni joins to talk through Bob Iger's linear media strategy, and weigh the effects of the strikes on Hollywood and the media. Host: Bryan Curtis Guest: Matt Belloni Producer: Erika Cervantes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by destination NBA, a G-League Odyssey. It is available to stream on Prime Video on Tuesday, August 8th. It is produced by Religion of Sports and Ringer Films. Oh, yeah. This is our documentary about the 2020-23 G-League season. We immersed ourselves. We followed five future stars or possible stars who are competing in the G-League, the NBA's Development League, as they try to achieve their lifelong,

dream of making it to the NBA. It's an awesome documentary. Again, August 8th, go check it out on Prime Video. Hello, media consumers. Welcome to Pressbox's final edition. Brian Curtis of the Ringer here, along with producer Erica Servantes. I'm going to bring on Matt Bellany in just a second to talk about the Hollywood strikes and what they're doing to celebrity profiles and get some inside dope on ESPN's Jimmy

Bataro and Disney. But first, I want to try something a little different. let's do three headlines to get you through the weekend. Do you hear that music Erica found? I'm a hairpiece away from being an actual news anchor. Headline one, why can't we watch the Trump trials? This week's big story is that Donald Trump got indicted for a third time on charges relating to his trying to overturn the 2020 election,

which of course led to the siege of the U.S. Capitol on January 6th. It's a huge story, but you're not going to be able to watch this trial. Or Trump's other federal trial about handling classified documents. Because as Charlotte Klein notes in Vanity Fair, cameras aren't allowed in federal criminal trials. Now, this can be changed, Klein reports, and it should be changed, for three reasons. One, because in a rare bipartisan moment, both Democrats and Trump's lawyer want cameras in the courtroom. They both think it will help their case with the public. Two, maybe this is just me, but it seems really weird that we could watch the Murdoom murder trial in South Carolina,

but not the trial of a former president who tried to steal the 2020 election. The third reason we need cameras is because something really weird happened with print journalists yesterday when Trump got to court in Washington, D.C. As J.D. Cabaluto pointed out in semaphore, journalists took it upon themselves to record every single gesture that Donald Trump made. These are real examples. Donald Trump sitting at a table, folding and unfolding hands, unable to keep still, he picks up a document and quickly puts it down again.

Here's another. Trump could be seen staring right towards special counsel Jack Smith, knocking his clasped hands on the table in a tense way. When political reporters start sounding like old-timey baseball writers who worked at the New York Journal American. It's time to put cameras in the courtroom. I have enough sports writing in my life as it is. Headline two, a debate that needs a star.

After Donald Trump found out he was about to be indicted, he took a very interesting meeting. It was with Fox News executives. Now, the first important date on the presidential calendar is coming up on Wednesday, August 23rd. That's when Fox News hosts the first Republican debate. Trump has made noises like he's going to sit it out. And now, as the New York Times as Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman report, Fox sat down with Donald Trump to try to convince him to be the debate's star. Now, the two sides, Trump and Fox News, have very different calculations here.

Debates, as we all know, are TV shows. And Fox wants its show to have the biggest star, never mind the indictments. Trump's calculation, which he has said out loud more than once, goes like this. Why would I debate candidates like Ron DeSantis and Tim Scott that I'm leading by 30 points in most national polls or at least 20 plus points in the recent Times poll of Iowa? Of course, you could also argue the reverse

that the reason those candidates are trailing so badly is because they refuse to really run against Trump and Trump merely appearing on stage in Milwaukee would completely neuter their attacks if they even exist in the first place. I do want to point you to one sentence in Swan and Haberman's story that I really loved. Fox execs told the former president that he excels on center stage and that it presents an opportunity for him to show off his debate skills.

See, Mr. President, that one-on-one you did with Greg Gutfeld, we didn't feel like got all of you. There's more upside here that can only be showcased if you come to our debate. Yeah, sure. instant coverage of the Republican debate with or without Donald Trump will be here on the press box on August 23rd. Finally, headline three, Soccer's Forever Wars.

For those enjoying the Women's World Cup, you might not know that there was a war raging in sports writing 10 or 15 years ago. I'm not making this up. The war was about soccer. The anti-socker case made by some sportswriters, went like this. Soccer bad.

Soccer boring. And the pro-socker case was, actually, soccer good, soccer fun. Mercifully, the pro-socer forces prevailed, and the war ended. Or so I thought until I read two recent tweets.

One is from Roger Bennett, one of the hosts of the Men in Blazers podcast, who while sharing a highlight from the Columbia-Germany match tweeted, I feel sorry for anyone who does not like football. Manuel Venegas had a wonderful moment at the World Cup and were sub-tweeting people who don't love soccer. Who is this for?

Did an old Frank DeFord column get retweeted or something? A few weeks before that, the former New York Times columnist Robert Lipsight said that the paper's sports section lost some of its relationship with New York City when it started covering soccer instead of the Mets. This time the Men in Blazers account tweeted, 85-year-old former Times sports writing legend Robert Lipsite tells world what really ruined present-day New York Times.

Too much soccer. Now put aside the tinge of ageism in that tweet. Why does it matter that my pal LipSite is 85 years old? I ask again, didn't soccer win the war? The Times Sports section, even in its death rows, had two writers covering soccer. as many or more than we're covering every other sport. Soccer won! It's over!

But keep fighting the good fight, you 50-something podcasters. That's weekend headlines. I first met Matt Bellany, appropriately enough, over an expensive salad at a restaurant on Sunset Boulevard. He was then editing the Hollywood Reporter. He's now hosting the excellent and info-rich podcast The Town and breaking news over at Puck. He's here to tell us what the Hollywood Strikes are doing to entertainment writing.

Matt, welcome to the press box. Thanks for having me. I'm a little disappointed. There isn't a lounge piano player behind you. I just always assumed that was the case on your show. Yeah, he's off today. He was a sag after member, it turned out, and we couldn't get him in the building. So before we leap into that, I want to start with a story you had this week.

You broke news in Puck that Disney CEO Bob Eiger brought back a couple of old pals to help him figure out what to do with ESPN and his linear networks. What happened there? So Tom Stags and Kevin Mayer both were previous heir apparent, or apparently it's called Ayers apparent. And they both left the company sort of unceremoniously after being passed over or indicated that they were not getting the top job at Disney. Iger was sort of unwilling to pass the baton.

Most people assume that they were never coming back. You know, they sort of set up their own spite store called Candle-Den. media where they got billions of dollars from a private equity firm to start buying up companies like Reese Witherspoon's company and the proprietor of Cocoa Mellon, which is a very popular kids property. And all of a sudden, Iger faced with this conundrum of what to do with ESPN and the linear television networks goes on ESPN, essentially throws up the for sale sign and says, yeah, we are a seller, if we can find the right buyer for the linear networks, doesn't want to sell all of ESPN, but he wants what he calls a strategic partner to

come in and give them money or distribution or content or something to add value to ESPN. And to help him in that process, he looks out to Kevin Mayer and Tom Stags and says, hey, come on in, consult. And, you know, there's a, it's just a consulting agreement at the, point. It's not like these guys are being groomed to be the new CEO, but obviously, anytime you bring two guys who were previously tipped as potential CEOs back into the company fold at a time when Iger himself has been unable to help find his successor, people are going to start speculating. So that's basically what's going on now. So Marin Stags were the previous

errors apparent. And ESPN chairman Jimmy Petaro has been the most full. current era parent. I don't know if he's the most floated. He's one of the most floated. I mean, there's Dana Walden who runs the TV group. There's Josh DeMorrow at the Parks Division. Like it's sort of, and none of them is really the ideal candidate.

There isn't a situation where there's a clear number two. These people all have flaws. So that's what's adding a little bit more speculation. I know you'll appreciate this, but I have loved how the speculation has taken on the tenor of a college football coaching search. where everybody's name gets floated. We had the Adam Silver moment in the spring.

Cheryl Sandberg. Who else has been floated? I mean, there's a million names out there. What do you think Pataro's chances are of getting the big job? Honestly, I think it's pretty slim. I mean, ESPN's a great business, but it's not the shining star that it once was, hence this whole effort to figure out what to do with it.

And to put him in charge of the whole company would send a weird message, I think. Like we're taking someone who's not at a growth business and putting him in charge of what we hope will be an overall growth business. Certainly well liked within the company. But, you know, Disney's such a weird company in that the CEO job, you have to have a lot of abilities. And the Parks Division and consumer products and the showmanship. You have to be willing to go on TV and talk about the brand. I mean, this is a brand that people have really strong feelings about and connections to. It's not like any other company.

I think that's what's contributing to the sense that there's nobody out there that can do this job. I think it's a little bit short-sighted. There are people that could do this job. But Iger's kind of a unique guy, and I don't think he's going. And right now, maybe they groom Petaro or someone else, but right now he doesn't have the full package. Like you said, an imperfect candidate. His resume would include big deals with the NFL with the SEC,

talent hirings like Buck and Akeman. All of which are important. But there was speculation as to whether Disney would sell ESPN outright and just like throw up their hands and get out of the sports business. I mean, it is so expensive now to bid on these sports rights.

And even Disney, which is the largest of the traditional entertainment studios, has a hard time when you're in a bidding war with Amazon and Apple. That's not great. And that's the future for sports rights because it's pretty clear that the big tech companies have recognized that the value in accumulating eyeballs is in sports. I mean, Google is now there with Sunday ticket on YouTube. Apple is there with all the sports rights they're buying up, including the PAC 12. Don't forget about the PAC 12 network. I knew you'd mention that

at least once. So sad. And Amazon obviously with Sunday night football, with Thursday night football. So, you know, these tech companies are going to be coming for the NBA rights and for all the other rights that come up. And ESPN has got to do something to be able to compete. Speaking of Apple, what names are you hearing could be ESPN strategic partner, quote unquote? Well, we know, CNBC reported that Iger has been meeting with all the leads. And the strategy seems to be to kind of wiggle Disney, wiggle their way into bed. with these leagues to have some kind of partnership and get better games, perhaps even take over some of the local games. So ESPN would essentially be a distributor of local games for certain

markets. I'm not quite sure how that would work because typically those rights are very expensive. That's the whole problem with the regional sports network model right now is the price of those channels has been run up by the leagues and by the teams. And they can't make. up their money on subscribers anymore. So, you know, they're going to be looking for a way to replicate that revenue. ESPN wants to come in and distribute those games, but they don't want to pay the big bucks. So I don't know where that's going to end up. But, you know, there's always, like, doing a deal. They can do a deal with a tech company, you know, where Amazon invests or Apple invests, I don't know that they would want to do that. Those outlets tend to like to own rather

than just invest passively in a rivals company. You know, maybe private equity. Maybe, you know, there's a lot of people with money out there. And ESPN is still a gigantic brand in sports. Let's talk about journalism. What effect is the actor strike had on entertainment writing and entertainment reporting? Well, certainly the A story. I mean, everything has sort of become secondary and everyone is chasing this one

thing that is kind of this beast. And it's a difficult story to cover because, A, the parties are intent on keeping the discussions secret. Now, I've been able to get around that just through having sources at the top level. But a lot of the coverage I see is just totally wrong. Like, they're talking to someone third, fourth hand, and it's just like not accurate. And there's not a lot of ways to confirm, when both sides through their PR apparatus are throwing up their hands and saying,

we're not doing this. We're not doing the normal confirmation process. The business of journalism, you know, it's interesting. The trade press that covers this stuff the most closely often gets accused of being in the tank for the studio side because those outlets are so dependent on advertising from the studios and the relationships with the studios. And I think that gets overblown a little, having been in that chair, you know, that the journalists don't think about that when they're reporting the story. And in fact, if I had to say anything on what, you know, who's getting the more favorable coverage, just the fact that the writers and actors are so available.

They're literally everywhere all the time on social media and available for comment and like to get their stories out there. and Fran Drescher will show up at a target if you invite her to speak about the big bad studios. That, I think, does tilt the coverage in favor of the striking side because, you know, media, how media works, you gravitate towards access. When someone wants to talk to you, you let them talk to you. So I think that the coverage, you know, now obviously the outlets that cover this are financially incentivized for this strike to be over and for the studios to get a deal. deal. But day-to-day coverage, I don't think they're biased like a lot of the striking writers and actors think they are. I was interested to read in Friday that SAG after members will not be

able to attend premieres, do interviews for completed work, go to award shows, attend film festivals, or even promote projects on social media while the strike is in effect. What does that actually do to the bottom line of movies that are going to be coming out over the next few months? Well, that's the leverage. That's the whole thing. I mean, you hire an actor because they're a great actor, but you also hire an actor because of that actor's ability to promote and get attention for the project. So not having that is a huge piece of leverage for the guild. And that's actually what's causing some of these movies to get pushed from the end of this year into 2024. Sony basically pushed their entire slate, not the entire slate, but most of their movies into, next year because they're nervous about the stars being able to promote. And we saw the Venice Film Festival. The big movie was this Zendaya movie Challengers, which then got pushed by MGM into next year because they didn't have her.

The reason she got more than $10 million to star in that movie was because she has more than 100 million social media followers and can generate worldwide headlines on a red carpet. And if that's not going to happen, you're in trouble. So what are the things that hurt the most? Social media, do you think? I think these days, yeah, the social media stuff really hurts, but it's not just that. You know, if an actor can't do press interviews or do a film festival red carpet, that's a problem. I was thinking when you and I were growing up, the old hierarchy of what the studios wanted when a movie came out was a glossy magazine cover, big sit down on TV, their late night or if they could get Barbara Walters.

What is the new hierarchy? What do the studios want now? I think they want social promotion. I mean, these actors with huge following, whether it's Selena Gomez or Zendaya or Tom Holland, that is the new currency, whether you can create a conversation online. I mean, look at the difference these days

between hit movies and not hit movies is often whether these things take off on social media. Look at what happened with Barbie. You look at what happened with Super Mario Brothers, last summer with the minions movie, that becoming a TikTok meme. The goal is to create a conversation on social media so that it reaches young people

because you're not going to reach young people. Are you kidding me? A magazine? Like maybe a couple of the fashion magazines can break through with the photo of the cover, but you're not breaking through with a traditional magazine profile unless you say something stupid and you start getting the press you don't want,

which is really the only way that you get coverage for a magazine piece these days. I do think that the talk shows are still meaningful because you can get, it's not just that you get the hit on the late night show. That's sort of immaterial. It's that often those clips will go around on social media. But podcasts also are sort of the new talk shows.

You know, if you get a gig on Smartless or Joe Rogan or Dax or one, or Bill Simmons, one of the big all-audience podcasts, you can get some real, some significant earned media there. I always think it's funny when they do have those big glossy magazine covers because it always seems like the place it's most seen is when the actor tweets out a picture of the glossy magazine cover.

Yeah. Rather than any access to the actual object. Right, but that's the implicit understanding when you do a piece. Listen, I, at Hollywood Reporter, I booked 40 covers a year. So I'm very familiar with the song. and dance that goes along with the magazine cover. And the implicit agreement when you do a sit down with a star like that is that if you like the piece, you will promote it on your social media channels. And there's a whole conversation that goes on behind the scenes with the magazine and

the social media team for the star about how that is going to happen. You debut it with the star. You give it to them early. You know, you make sure they have a link that they can put in their bio so people can go read the story. You try to get, you know, a few Instagram stories out of it because that people are more likely to click on the link in that than they are to go to the bio of the star. You want TikTok, like, you give him behind the scenes footage. There's a whole thing, which of course, you know, you could argue taints the actual journalism. If you are so in bed with the star and trying to get approval and promotion from the star, you're thinking a little bit less about serving the reader and doing a great story. That's the argument. I tried to not think about

that at Hollywood Reporter, but obviously it comes in. Luckily, at Puck, I don't have to think about publicists or what people think of the story. I'm serving the reader entirely. But obviously, that's what kind of killed the magazine piece, is that these outlets are so desperate for the approval of the star. And all that stuff about Instagram stories, that was all spelled out in advance before the star even said down. Not explicitly. Not explicitly. Not explicitly, but you have a conversation for sure with the PR person. Yeah. This is what I was going to end on, Matt. What were some of the things you heard from stars and their handlers about what they wanted from you when you booked those profiles?

What kinds of conditions did you hear? It differs. I mean, shockingly, for both men and women, the number one concern is how they look. That is always, you know, getting the right groomers, getting the photographer, getting the setting, making sure everything is fine for the shoot, because that's the number one. I think maybe because they realize that outlets kind of don't go there anymore on the actual written piece because they know that the backlash would be so severe. The photos,

the photos are where the publicists really focus on. And then it's just access, you know, the level of access that magazines settle for these days is amazing. You know, at Hollywood Reporter, we had leverage over certain people because during the awards seasons for Oscars and Emmys, that cover is meaningful,

you know, to get in the conversation and probably a little less so today because people aren't reading print as much. But even a few years ago, it was, you know, you wanted that cover to position your movie as an Oscar or an Emmy contender. So we could ask for,

a little bit more. But outside of that, it's like, oh, okay, so-and-so has 45 minutes between Junkets. Can we do the interview then? You know, how about a lunch? You know, how about a breakfast? Like, that's the conversation you're having these days. It's not, you know, people have this vision of like the 1970s, like embedding with a star. Are you kidding me? Like very, very few times that's actually happened. And when it does happen, it's like a miracle. We had a guy that got to go to George Clooney's Lake Cuomo house and spend time with him and Amal and the kids. Like, that's fun. That's a, and the story was way better.

That's the thing. It's like, the story's always better when you have more access. And, but the PR people in the stars, they don't think that way typically. They think, how can I get, get in, get out, get the promotion I want and have it be credible as a piece of journalism. Just credible enough with the least amount of time, the least amount of things I'm asking up the star. That's the win.

is to not inconvenience the star in the slightest, but still get the cover and the piece. I thought it was so funny when there was that dust up between variety and the Atlantic and your very own puck the other day about the whole Chris Lick thing. And they said there were only four significant interviews with Chris Licked. And I was like, how many bites of the Apple do you think journalists get with famous people? If it had been only four, that's like a ton to me. And I mean, I'm friendly with a lot of people involved in this.

I don't want to talk too much about it. But like, I know that writer very well. And she has done profiles with far less access than that. Matt, Bellany, listen to him on the town. Read him and puck. Matt, thanks for coming on the press box. No problem. That's the press box.

I'm Brian Curtis. Production Magic by Erica Servantes. The press box recommendation this week. I was down in New York City on Tuesday night. I want to see a movie. I have no Barbenheimer takes for you, but I did get over to film forum to see this amazing new documentary

called 20 Days in Maripole. And you'll forgive me if this reduces me to the kind of cliches I usually like to make fun of, because 20 days in Maripole is unlike anything I've ever seen and I've been thinking about it pretty much nonstop since Tuesday night. The movie was made by a Pulitzer Prize winner,

a Ukrainian AP reporter and videographer named Mistislav Chernov. Chernov and his team were in the Ukrainian city of Maripole during the Russian invasion. They were able to capture these unbelievable and horrifying images of the Russian military attacking civilian targets. They took these images and sent them around the world. One of the scenes has them going to the one place in the city where they could find working internet to send them to their bosses. The images were used on American cable networks. They were denounced as frauds on Russian television.

Eventually, Chironov and his team got very, very worried for their safety. They were hiding in a hospital for many days, and they snuck out in a Red Cross convoy and were able to leave Maripole. The film is wrenching. It is haunting. It is, oddly, if this is an appropriate word, very cinematic, both in its visuals and in its music. And if there's any hedge here, I would just say that there are very, very graphic pictures. of death in this movie. If children and even babies

in mortal peril is a line you draw, don't go see it. But as a piece of journalism and as a piece about journalistic responsibility in a time of war, I can't recommend it enough.

See 20 days in Marriott. On Monday, Shoemaker and I return for more lukewarm takes about the medium. Have a fantastic weekend.