Two nights after his surprise elimination from season 23 of “American Idol” on April 28, 2025, Egyptian-born crooner Filo addressed fans eager to hear how he was doing. In honor of the April 28 episode's theme, “Iconic Idol Moments,” Filo performed “And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going,” which was a standout moment during Jennifer Hudson‘s journey on the show. He and British R&B singer Ché Chesterman were sent home at the end of the show — Chesterman back to Essex, England, and Filo to his family's home base near San Francisco. Filo remained silent until about 24 hours after his elimination. On the night of April 29, he posted only a photo in his Instagram Stories from inside his flight home with a brief message. He tagged Hollywood Burbank Airport, and wrote, “This marks the end of an incredible journey. “And just like that, my @AmericanIdol journey comes to an end,” he wrote. Filo, who graduated from the prestigious Berklee School of Music in 2024, wrote to his fans, “To everyone who's supported me, I owe you a great deal of gratitude,” the Berklee . Making it to the #TOP12 is no easy feat, and I truly couldn't have done it without each and every one of you!” He also thanked his new “family” of contestants he bonded with since auditions, which took place in the fall of 2024, noting that “as bittersweet as this moment is, the bitterness is from how much I'm going to miss my Idol family❤️” I love every single one of you with all my heart and I can't wait to see what God has in store for all of you!🤩” Filo also thanked his brother Arssani and mom, Haidi, whom he called “my rock in this world.” They were frequently seen in the studio audience as she sobbed during each of her son's performances. The family fled Egypt when Filo was in middle school to escape persecution of Coptic Orthodox Christians. Speaking with reporter Dean McCarthy after the April 28 show, judge Carrie Underwood was she felt “overwhelmed” by the level of talent among season 23's top contestants, which means very gifted singers will wind up going home. Underwood wasn't the only one stunned by Filo's departure. Fans flooded social media, including one who wrote on his April 30 post, “those votes weren't right i'm telling you. “My jaw dropped and stayed on the floor for a solid 15 minutes when you didn't make it into the top 10,” another wrote.

When Shawna Delong won the trip of a lifetime to watch longtime Hallmark star Marcus Rosner film his latest project, she never expected to wind up in the movie. But when “The Final Victim” co-starring Brittany Bristow premieres on Lifetime, Delong will make her onscreen debut right alongside them. In late April 2025, Rosner told EntertainmentNOW that DeLong won the epic trip during a raffle held on board Expedia Cruises' “Cruising With Friends” fan trip in January featuring him, Jesse Hutch, and Jen Lilley. There was no promise of a walk-on role, but Rosner said he wanted to make the trip extra special for Delong — a fellow Canadian who flew from Ontario to Edmonton with her mom, Kimberley Delong, and was “so enthusiastic” about being there. Like, she just seemed excited and interested, but also quite calm. She didn't seem overwhelmed at all, which was great, because I could totally see a fan getting this experience and being overwhelmed. Noting that Shawna and Kim “were just thrilled to be here,” Rosner first had lunch with them at a favorite spot in Edmonton, Chianti. Once they got to the movie set, Rosner decided to elevate the experience, explaining, “We got Shawna into a cop uniform. “But then later that week,” Rosner continued, “we did a night shoot on top of this rooftop in downtown Edmonton, and in this scene, we are about to raid the killer (who's) up there. Rosner also invited his brothers to join the scene, dressed as fellow cops, and wrote on Instagram that it was an “unforgettable” night of filming. “We had a medical situation with somebody on set one night that we haven't encountered before,” he told EntertainmentNOW. “I won't say exactly what happened, but it was very stressful for a bit, and Shawna and her mom very quietly came up at one point. And I was like, ‘Nah, stick around, things will be touch and go for a bit, but you guys can stay.' They just didn't stress me out at all. Although Rosner frequently has visitors watching from the sidelines on movie sets, this was the first time a fan has won a trip like this with him. “Anytime someone comes to watch, I always feel this great insecurity or self-consciousness, because I know that it'll be less glamorous than they were imagining,” he said. “But if Shawna and Kim felt any of that along the way, they didn't express it, and they just seemed excited in all the ways,” he smiled, adding that he's open to doing something similar in the future. In fact, Rosner said that now that he has multiple fan experiences under his belt, he's definitely open to participating in more. Rosner told EntertainmentNOW in the fall that he was a bit nervous about agreeing to take part in several fan events for the first time, including December's first-ever Hallmark Christmas Experience. Rosner and his wife also set sail with fans on the Expedia Cruises excursion in early January, a five-day trip to the Bahamas, where Shawna won the trip that led to her upcoming movie debut. Rosner said he suspects “The Final Victim” will air on Lifetime in the fall and said he's also just wrapped a new Hallmark Christmas movie. Meanwhile, Expedia Cruises plans to announce which stars will be aboard its 2026 “Cruising With Friends” trip soon, with details to be released first on via its private Facebook group.

Days before jury selection is set to start in Sean “Diddy” Combs' sex trafficking trial, a federal judge today sought confirmation from the Bad Boys Records founder that prosecutors put forth a plea deal and that he rebuffed it. Beyond that, no details are known about the written offer. Looking at likely life behind bars if found guilty on the racketeering, sex trafficking, transportation to engage in prostitution charges and more, the 55-year-old Combs (a.k.a .inmate 37452-054), who has pleaded not guilty, has been held in one of the more low-key units of Brooklyn's Metropolitan Detention Center since his arrest last September. A defendant not just in this criminal case, but in dozens and dozens of civil cases alleging assaults and abuse, Diddy has always sworn he is innocent, and all the interactions were consensual. A major element in Combs' rejection of the plea deal appears to be he truly wants his day in court to prove his innocence and beat the charges, well-placed sources tell us. The rest of today's hearing dealt with jury selection questionnaires and procedure, including what will and will not happen in open court. At the end of the less than one-hour hearing, Judge Subramanian told everyone he looked forward to seeing them on Monday morning. Of course, a spanner in the works of that could be the quickly settled ($30 million) assault and abuse suit and more from Victim-1, a.k.a former Combs girlfriend Cassie Ventura. Unlike many such high-profile cases and the other accusations against Combs, there is visual evidence of the violence and attacks Ventura says she endured from Diddy for years. Judge Subramanian ruled last week that 2016 L.A. hotel security footage of the couple, that CNN aired last spring, will be shown to the jury. The video, which Combs apologized for on social media when it became public, shows a half-naked Combs chasing an escaping Ventura down a corridor hitting and kicking her and dragging her back to his room where allegedly one of his so-called freak offs was happening. Add to that, among four victims id'd by the feds, Ventura has said she will testify in open court in this trial under her own name. Direct questioning of about 150 jury candidates starts on Monday morning. Judge Subramanian intends to bring each prospect into his courtroom, one at a time, to ask them about their backgrounds and potential biases, with none of the other jury candidates present. The judge called it “sequestered questioning,” designed to protect juror privacy around sensitive personal matters in a case dealing with sex trafficking. Prospective jurors will also be allowed to answer some questions in sidebar conferences with the judge and lawyers, out of earshot of reporters, if they consider the information to be too personal to discuss in open court, the judge said. If all goes as scheduled, it will take three days of sequestered questioning to whittle the field down to 45 jury and alternate candidates, who will then undergo voir dire questioning on bias, etc by the lawyers for both sides. Emphasizing that “time is of the essence,” Judge Subramanian today wondered aloud whether they can stay on schedule if sequestered questioning leads to a lot of breaks in the action for privacy sidebars. No one in court Thursday could promise him it wouldn't be an issue. In what will likely be a bmajor tenet of the soon to expand Marc Agnifilo- and Teny Geragos-led legal team's approach against SDNY, the defense has repeatedly complained the feds are using “racist” laws against Combs and seeking to “police non-conforming sexual activity.” Back on February 24, the defense took a swipe at “unconstitutionally broad” search warrants that had been used on Combs as part of spring 2024 raids of his Los Angeles and Miami homes, devices, digital storage and more. After coming up short over and over in requests for release on bail and keeping certain evidence out of the case, this week saw a small but significant notch in the defense's belt. One time mini-mogul Combs received permission on Wednesday from the court to wear “non-prison clothing” during his six-week estimated trial. Unlike almost all the past hearings in this case, no blood members of Combs' family appeared to be in court Thursday offering their support. A self-declared “godbrother' was there and Combs waved to him from the defense table. Get our Breaking News Alerts and Keep your inbox happy. We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. Get our latest storiesin the feed of your favorite networks We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services.

We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. Miike's next film is “Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo,” and shortly after the film was reported as a hot package due to hit the Cannes market, Neon announced on Wednesday evening that it was boarding the film with plans to both release it theatrically in North America as well as represent the sales rights at Cannes internationally. “Bad Lieutenant: Tokyo” will star Shun Oguri (“Godzilla v. Kong”) and Lily James (“Pam and Tommy”), as well as WWE star Liv Morgan joining the cast. Meanwhile, a deviant killer operating in the yakuza underworld seems to be shadowing their moves. Related Stories ‘Everything's Going to Be Great' Trailer: Bryan Cranston and Allison Janney Are Struggling Regional Theater Actors Be the Industry Cockroach: Steven Soderbergh's Advice to First-Time Filmmakers Filming on the project is expected to begin this month. “A team of incredibly talented actors and crew has gathered in Tokyo. I'm about to throw a fastball straight down the middle of your strike zone — no tricks, no gimmicks,” Miike said in a statement. Executive producers include Tom Quinn, Yuzo Kuwahara, Tetsu Fujimura, Paula Paizes, Alainée Kent, Peter Watson, Ivan Kelava, Max Loeb and Mike Apgar. The deal was negotiated by Neon's Sarah Colvin, VP of Acquisitions, and Paula Paizes from Pressman Film, and Recorded Picture Company's Ivan Kelava on behalf of the filmmakers. “We're all delighted to reinterpret this iconic IP with a master filmmaker like Takashi Miike,” said producer Jeremy Thomas of Recorded Picture Company. “We've produced 10 films in Japan, most recently “Grand Maison Paris” which has grossed over $28M domestically, and it's a fertile place to create and distribute films. I feel the time is right for this irreverent hybrid.” Just as maestros Ferrara and Herzog delivered films as radically different as their own voices, Miike's adaptation is unrelentingly wild and unique,” said Sam Pressman, CEO of Pressman Film, “My father Edward R. Pressman, always believed this story of corruption, both of police and the human soul, has a global resonance. To realize this next evolution now in Tokyo with Director Miike, Neon and my father's lifelong friend Jeremy Thomas — all true believers in the power of independent cinema — is both an honor and a dream come true.” Miike is also producing a new adaptation of his classic horror film “Audition” for Focus Features, which has Charli XCX in talks to star in the project. Neon also has a number of films it's presenting at Cannes, including Joachim Trier's “Sentimental Value,” Julia Ducouranu's “Alpha,” Raoul Peck's “Orwell,” and Michael Angelo Covino's “Splitsville.” We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services.

"It can't even be called music," the embattled rapper spewed of Cole. Ye (formerly Kanye West) hasn't let up when it comes to repeatedly taking shots at J. Cole and Kendrick Lamar. During a livestream on Wednesday (April 30), West claimed he hates Cole's music and disparaged the Compton rapper along with Lamar's fans. Ye continued that if anyone in the room with him at that moment was a J. Cole fan, he didn't want them to tell him because otherwise, he'd devalue their opinion. The embattled rapper then turned his attention back to Lamar and took shots at any fan who would list the Pulitzer-winning rapper as their GOAT. Billboard has reached out to J. Cole and Lamar's reps for comment. “I DON'T LIKE KENDRICK LAMARS MUSIC,” he wrote in March. “HE RAPS VERY GOOD BUT I DIDNT NEED TO HEAR HIM ON CARTI ALBUM.” While there's plenty of history between Cole and West, the Chicago native — who has faced widespread criticism for his repeated hate speech — claimed in early April that Cole's music was for “virgins” and he's “hurting hip-hop.” “I hate J Cole music so much,” West said matter-of-factly on X. Kanye also dissed J. Cole last year with his “Like That” remix. Cole has jabbed at West on multiple occasions in the past. He previously checked him on 2016's “False Prophets” and 2019's “Middle Child,” saying he feels West hasn't lived up to the billing of his legend status. However, following the repeated shots, Cole took the high road and showed Ye love during his set at Dreamville Fest 2025 in April, where he saluted West for clearing samples for him throughout his decorated career. He uploaded his lost 2022 Donda 2 album to streaming services for the first time on Tuesday night (April 29). A daily briefing on what matters in the music industry A daily briefing on what matters in the music industry

It's been two and a half years since getting the proverbial offer he could not refuse from Disney Entertainment co-chairman Dana Walden, Eric Schrier left the tight-knit executive team at FX after two decades to take over Disney Television Studios, which houses 20th Television and 20th Television Animation. Over that time, he has spearheaded major deals with networks and talent including the recent four-season pickup of four 20th Animation series by Fox: The Simpsons, Family Guy, Bob's Burgers as well as American Dad! in its return to the network after an 11-year run on TBS. Schrier also oversaw the merger of 20th Television and ABC Signature five and a half years after the two studios became corporate siblings following Disney's acquisition of Fox assets, and took oversight of Disney's global originals strategy. In an interview with Deadline, Schrier speaks about all of that as well as 20th TV's current IP push with half a dozen reboots in the works, including Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Malcolm In the Middle and Scrubs, the studio's talent deal strategy amid industry contraction, and its new compensation model which is being embraced by talent, he says. Additionally, he shares his thoughts on the industry post-Peak TV and selling outside of Disney. DEADLINE: How did the blockbuster 4×4 deal come about? Its length is obviously tied to Fox's current licensing deal with Disney-owned Hulu where the four animated comedies stream. SCHRIER: We've had a long-standing relationship with Fox on adult animation that goes back as long as The Simpsons has been on the air, which through this end of this deal will be over 40 seasons and over 860 episodes. When I took this job, I didn't really know that much about our adult animation business, and it's a fascinating business. They're global shows, and we have a really great partnership with Fox. So as they were coming to the end of the current window, we started conversations very early on with Fox about, how do we extend the relationship, and how do we keep these shows going for as long as possible? [Fox Entertainment CEO] Rob Wade, [Fox Network President] Michael Thorn, [20th TV Animation head] Marci Proietto and I sat down and talked about, creatively, what was the right idea for these shows? And we came up with this historic deal, which was for 16 seasons of television. I don't think there's ever been an order of 16 seasons at one time. The shows do tremendously well on Sunday nights, that's a great platform to premiere the shows on, and then they go next day on Hulu, which benefits us as a larger company as well. That relationship has been very fruitful, and we wanted to figure out how to continue that on. And then there was a mutual desire to get it done and do it for all that time. was something that we really value at the company and see as a long-term asset for us as well. So in my mind, it's a win-win for everybody. DEADLINE: In the past couple of years, you revived two other 20th Animation former Fox series, Futurama and King of the Hill but it was American Dad! that went to Fox while they became Hulu originals. Was it just the timing when American Dad! Futurama had already premiered as a Hulu original, and King of the Hill is premiering this summer, and it's really good, really excited about it. So it was timing and how much could fit on the Fox schedule with all the other shows that they're doing. But there's a very symbiotic relationship between Fox adult animation and Hulu and 20th Animation as a studio. The studio and network are not affiliated, and I was thinking how old some of the voice actors will be in four years… I think as long as the shows are creatively vibrant and that the economics makes sense, we're going to figure out a way to continue to do them. DEADLINE: So this was not done as a final deal? SCHRIER: There's no plans that those would be the final seasons. I think three years from now, there'll be lots of conversations about what the future is for all of those shows. We'll have really robust conversations with the creative partners first, what they want to do, and then ultimately, with Fox and our partners at Hulu. I don't think Fox has made a final determination on it; it's another show that we really love. DEADLINE: I've reported that you were able to maintain the returning series' license fees. The sizes of the orders are a little smaller than in years past but you have been keeping them at previous levels by making The Simpsons and Family Guy exclusive episodes for Disney+ and Hulu. SCHRIER: We looked at it as a four-season order, so you're looking at the sum total of all the episodes that we were producing, and it was a conversation with the talent about, what do they think they can do? On Family Guy and The Simpsons, we're doing exclusive episodes for Disney+ and for Hulu that won't air on Fox, and that made sense for us; we worked through it on a show-by-show basis. There's no cut specific parameters of how to do it, and this felt like the perfect order pattern for all four of them. But we looked at it not in a season-by-season basis but in sum total, so if you think about it in that way, it's a pretty extraordinary order. DEADLINE: Will there be any exclusive episodes of Bob's Burgers for Hulu? Nothing I can comment on at this time but hopefully down the road, there may be an opportunity to do it. DEADLINE: What about animated originals beyond the legacy shows? Currently, you have Solar Opposites, which is ending, and The Great North, which likely is ending too. SCHRIER: I'm really excited about the stuff that Marci and her team are working on. We have projects in the pipeline that I'm really looking forward to; hopefully there's another great adult animated hit in there. They're just tremendous, and there's nothing like them in all television. We are the most prolific studio in adult animation, and our plan is to continue to do that, working hard with our Hulu partners and our Disney+ partners, because I think there's some shows that we can do In the animation space, more adult for Hulu or young adult for Disney+, that I feel really good about, but I don't want to speak about any specific project. That is some heavy leaning into IP. SCHRIER: I think it's more coincidental than a specific desire. Obviously, we have a great library of amazing IP within the Fox library that came over in the [2019] transaction, as well as the Disney library; ABC Studios has a tremendous library as well, Scrubs is one of those titles that comes in there. [20th TV President] Karey Burke and her team are always looking to see what's in that library, what our creative partners at the studio are interested in telling those stories and is there an organic way to reboot those stories. It's not like there was some sort of mandate, let's get a bunch of old IP and redo them. It's all if there's the right creative story to tell. In the case of Buffy, it stemmed out of Karey Burke and [Hulu Originals and ABC Entertainment Scripted President] Simran Sethi had always wanted to try to figure out a way to reboot that show. It ends up that Chloé Zhao loves Buffy, so we put them together. Sarah Michelle Gellar has been a part of it from the get-go as well; she is an executive producer. [Executive producer] Gail Berman is back; she's been behind the scenes trying to pull it all together. I think all of these reboots come from that idea of, “What's the new way in which we can tell these stories?” Not “Okay, they're IP and let's go reboot them.” DEADLINE: Is there any chance for Malcolm to go beyond the four-episode revival that you have commissioned? SCHRIER: That came out of [series creator] Linwood Boomer's brain of, is there a way to do this and put the band back together for a special four-episode run? I think the scripts are really funny and I'm really excited to see how it all comes together. DEADLINE: How is the Scrubs reboot coming together? I don't know exactly what the specifics are on it today, but ultimately, I think the creative team really wants to figure out how to do it. Obviously it's very complicated because of the business terms. So my feeling is, when there's a creative desire, you usually figure these things out, but we'll see. We're also doing Group Chat with Kenya Barris and Kim Kardashian for Hulu. A lot of really good pilots in development. DEADLINE: Why was the decision made to fold ABC Signature into 20th Television after years of speculation, and why last fall? SCHRIER: When I first started in this role, there was a certain amount of volume that we felt like we needed to be able to produce, and it made sense to have two studios. But as we started to calibrate how much content we needed for our platforms, it just didn't make sense to have two studios and the infrastructure associated with them, so we merged them, and it's going really well. Inherently, there was always a little bit of friction by having two studios; this makes it a lot cleaner. We have an amazing roster of talent at the studio, and they're having a tremendous amount of success right now. Our legacy series are doing tremendously well, 9-1-1, Only Murders In the Building, Grey's Anatomy. High Potential was a big win for us last year on ABC, that show's just doing great; Kaitlin Olson is amazing in it. Shifting Gears, the half-hour multi-cam, bringing that [genre] back, and it's performing very well. Good American Family on Hulu, which recently launched, starting Ellen Pompeo, is doing great as well. And then we have Paradise, which was a breakout hit for us. It comes from Dan Fogelman, who's an amazing creator, he's been at the studio for a really long time. And then we have Tracker, which is super interesting. We produce that for them, but we also have that show on Disney+ around the world, we have the international streaming rights to it, and it appears on Disney+ as well as Hulu in the SVOD window. Not only are we producing it as a traditional studio, but it also comes back to our Disney platforms. DEADLINE: You didn't mention one recent hit, Nobody Wants This for Netflix. Will you continue to focus on your own platforms while still selling outside? But on a case-by-case basis, we'll examine third-party business, and does it make financial or business sense for us. Some of the third-party business makes a lot of sense for us, like Tracker, and others don't make as much sense. We have shows in production or development at multiple platforms around town, and those are all good businesses for us. We're really proud of Nobody Wants This, it's a big hit for Netflix. Erin and Sara Foster are talent that we were working with at the studio, and now we have an overall deal with them, so we're working on their next show. DEADLINE: You mentioned 20th TV's pacts with the Fosters, Dan Fogelman and Elgin James. Also, like others, you have converted some overall deals to first-look. With that said, we still have a tremendous roster of talent. So that works very well for the overall deal side. On the first-look side, we have an awesome roster of not only writers but producers in first-look deals at our studio, and that works really well for them, because they can develop with our roster of talent at the studio, they can develop for multiple brands. And I think we have an environment where, basically, most of the shows that they're going to develop, we have a potential home for on our platforms, whether it's ABC or FX or Hulu Originals or Disney Branded Television, there are different opportunities across that landscape for all of our talent to work. So first-look deals work really well for producers like Ryan Reynolds or the Rock. We have an overall deal with Warren Littlefield that works really well for him, he's highly prolific, we have a ton of shows with him. DEADLINE: There's one creator that you used to work with on the network side at FX, Ryan Murphy. Now he's one of the biggest names on your talent roster. Talk about getting to work with him on the studio side? He just has his finger on the pulse of what people want to watch. I've been working with Ryan for over 20 years; I worked with him on Nip/Tuck as a current executive, I've been working with him all the years I worked at FX, and it's been great to work with him in this different capacity at the studio. I'm really excited about the shows he has upcoming. We have four new shows in the pipeline from him: All's Fair; The Beauty; 9-1-1: Nashville, which is a great franchise for us; and American Love Story. The way we work with Ryan is different than with other creators, he's in a select few group of people that, if he has a great idea for another American Horror Story, and that's something that [FX Networks chairman] John [Landgraf] and the team at FX really want to do, we're going to figure it out. We don't have another incarnation of American Horror Story ordered, but it's a franchise that, by design, can always be rebooted. And so when Ryan has an idea that is great and can figure it out with his schedule of all the things that he's doing, I could very well see us doing another installment. SCHRIER: I really love Doctor Odyssey, I think it's a wildly inventive show, and we're doing everything we can to support it. That decision ultimately lies with Ryan Murphy, whether Ryan wants to continue to do it, and he feels like there's stories to tell that he feels confident in. DEADLINE: Were you involved in the decision to kill off Peter Krause's character on 9-1-1? I'm trying to see how high up the chain it went. DEADLINE: 9-1-1 spinoff Lone Star recently ended on Fox. The reasons were financial as the show was still doing OK. Is it something that we'll see more of, when for studios, due to business reasons, it's hard to continue with a show? As companies have to be profitable and have to justify the business behind all these shows, Lone Star became a very expensive show for what it was performing at and didn't make economic sense for the platform or the studio to continue with. And so unfortunately, Lone Star just wasn't achieving that level of success from a performance standpoint. DEADLINE: Lone Star was your last live-action series on Fox; it was vestige from the old times when the network and 20th TV were vertically integrated. Now that they are separated, is there a chance for you to do a drama for Fox under their current $3M-$4M an episode model? SCHRIER: We've had a lot of conversations with Michael and Rob about us producing live-action shows for them. They're operating under a specific cost structure, so it's finding the right idea that can fit in there. But I'd very much like to do that. DEADLINE: We referenced the challenging business environment that impacts pickup decisions. Does everything come down to money these days? We're trying to bend the cost curve down, and I look at that from a desire to support creativity. As shows become more and more expensive, there's a finite pool of money in which we can spend resources against those shows. I think collectively, getting to a place where shows' cost matches their performance is something the entire industry is going through and something I'm really focused on: how do we maintain a wide variety of shows, and a number of shows for the industry? Because I think that's really good for creativity. DEADLINE: Disney TV Studios changed the model for compensating talent before you started, replacing traditional backend with upfront payments and bonuses that allow Disney to exploit shows across platforms. SCHRIER: Yeah, our backend model, I was actually involved in creating it alongside Craig Hunegs, who was running Disney Television Studios at the time, him and I, Josh Sussman, who now leads Business Affairs [for Disney Entertainment Television], and [FX Business Affairs EVP] Kelly Cline really worked with the representative community on how do we create a better structure that rewards people in success and is much more transparent. It was designed, first and foremost, [as] how do we give the best experience to our creators, and how we create a transparent environment for them to be compensated appropriately and in success. DEADLINE: How is your relationship with FX two and a half years after leaving the network? Do you continue to have a close relationship with your former boss John Landgraf? SCHRIER: I still speak to them almost daily, work really closely with them, because in the other part of my job, which is the global original television strategy, I'm working on how that works, how much do we make and where do we make it, working with our platform partners and our studio partners on what's the best mix of product that we make. I love those guys, it's so great to work with them, and John's obviously an amazing partner, he has been my mentor. DEADLINE: Since you mentioned global originals, let's talk about that. How was your learning curve in that area? SCHRIER: First of all, it's been great working for Dana for the last two and a half years, she's just an amazing leader and amazing person and creative executive. She asked me to take on overseeing our local originals two years ago. At the time, we were producing over 140 shows all around the world, and now we're producing about 100 shows around world for Disney+, all in their local languages, in 25 different countries. We have teams in all of these markets that we're producing shows that are selecting and developing shows to commission for their audiences. Our strategy is very unique, I think, in the marketplace, which is, we have global brands and global IP that travel the world. We have Star Wars, Marvel, Disney Branded, Pixar, FX, Hulu originals, ABC shows. These shows travel the world and are known really well. So we don't need to make an excess volume of local originals. But what we need to do is complement those global shows with locally relevant stories for the audiences in the markets in which we have Disney+. For example, in Spain, we produced a show last year called Invisible, which is based on a very well known book there; that was in Spanish, intended for a Spanish audience. In the UK, Rivals was a big hit for us. And just two weeks ago, we premiered The Stolen Girl, which did really well in the UK, and is also doing very well in Hulu and Freeform here in the U.S. So we're looking at these titles on a global basis, but really designing them for the local markets to have local language and local flavor for that specific market. We produce a lot of Korean dramas that have traveled really well. Moving, created by Kang Full, and his second series, Light Shop, both have done tremendously well. He's a really inventive creator; he's actually a perfect example of the unique creativity that I'm finding all around the world. He's developing a subsequent season of Moving right now. Our team in France developed it with the producers, got them to do six 30-minute episodes, and it took France by storm. One was, we were producing about 30 to 40 shows in India, and now India is part of a joint venture with Reliance. When I first came in, we were making lots of shows all around the world, and there wasn't a cohesive strategy. So Dana created this role where it's global original television strategy, and part of my role is to help create a cohesive strategy with our partners at the direct-to-consumer unit, with [Direct-to-consumer President] Joe Earley and his team, to be more strategic about what we're making. Disney is based on long-running IP, and our our goal is to create long-running IP that can help power the platform for many years to come. DEADLINE: What is coming down the pike that you think may resonate globally? In France, The Lost Station Girls is a six-episode true crime limited series. There's a new show coming out in Korea called Tempest. It's a really good story about Juan, Pablo Escobar's son, who was raised by his henchmen; he calls them his killer nannies. I think we're just finishing production on it. DEADLINE: A question we always ask of your former boss, John Landgraf: Where is the television business going? Will the contraction ease up at some point, when can we see a bit of an expansion? SCRIER: I feel really bullish about our business, not only at the studio, but also for Disney and our direct-to-consumer businesses. We've gone through a transformative time over the last few years, and Dana and [Disney Entertainment co-chairman] Alan Bergman have done a great job leading our streaming services. I went through earlier all the shows that are working, and in the future, I feel really good about Disney and Disney's commitment in the long term, and the amount of volume of shows that we're doing as we continue to fine-tune that. There are different platforms of choice for for audiences, especially younger audiences, and I feel really good about our place within that ecosystem. DEADLINE: So life post-Peak TV is just fine? SCHRIER: Yeah, we're still producing a very significant amount of shows. We're actually producing a lot of shows here in California. The crew base in Los Angeles is excellent, our talent loves working here, we love working here. The Walt Disney Company is really committed to California, and I'm really excited about the increased tax incentive that is hopefully going to come to pass so that we can continue to do more shows here in Los Angeles. DEADLINE: You have a few shows that are filming on the Fox lot in West L.A. including High Potential. And how do you feel about leaving the Fox lot; a lot of you have offices there? SCHRIER: We're only in one building on the lot now from an office standpoint. We'll have a true creative campus here in Burbank with all the teams, and I think it will be good for us all to be together. And Fox lot in terms of production, we're still going to have some productions there, but some of them will move, and that's an ongoing discussion with the teams at Fox. Get our Breaking News Alerts and Keep your inbox happy. We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. Get our latest storiesin the feed of your favorite networks Send us a tip using our annonymous form. Sign up for our breaking news alerts We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. Deadline is a part of Penske Media Corporation. We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services.

This analysis is part of Billboard's music technology newsletter Machine Learnings. They showed me their latest handiwork: a TikTok page where every post features their client's song paired with an AI-generated video of a scenic landscape. I promised them anonymity, so I can't share these videos, but rest assured — all of them were convincingly realistic. My source has started paying a fan to post hundreds of these AI videos — generated in seconds using OpenAI's video tool, Sora — to TikTok to promote their artist's new single, with the hope that at least one of the videos will go viral. And they're not the only ones experimenting with AI to automate digital marketing. I also recently met with RHEI, a company that claims its proprietary AI agents — AI systems that can make decisions and take actions — can generate lyric videos and populate fan pages for artists without anyone lifting a finger. Already, music companies like Symphonic, Lyrical Lemonade and MNRK use RHEI's products. Though this technology is still in its infancy, using AI agents or video generators is clearly the super-charged next step for what's known as “fan page marketing,” which is the promotional method du jour in 2025. Music marketers have complained for the last few years that social media, especially TikTok, is oversaturated with content and music, and that breaking through the noise is becoming harder. Their response to this, almost universally, has been to combat the noise by turning up the metaphorical volume even louder. Now, marketers are promoting artists by circulating thousands of repurposed interview and livestream clips, user-generated content remixes, memes, live videos and — increasingly — AI-generated videos on “fan pages” run or paid for by the artists' team. Typically, this is all still coupled with classic influencer campaigns where various content creators are paid to make videos to a song, often without disclosing that these are paid advertisements. In 2018, Luminate reported that about 45,000 songs were uploaded to Spotify daily. Five years later, in 2023, Luminate said that number had grown to 120,000. In some ways, it's a beautiful thing — it's easier to release a song than ever before, allowing countless DIY artists chances at success they never would have had otherwise. But it's also led to what Lucian Grainge, chairman/CEO of Universal Music Group, has called a “content oversupply,” of which he said, “AI has already been a major contributor.” Migos' 24-track Culture II (2018), Rae Sremmurd's 27-track SR3MM (2018) and Drake's 25-track Scorpion (2018), are all popular, early examples of this phenomenon which is now common to see across all genres. More recently, Morgan Wallen, Zach Bryan, The Kid LAROI and Taylor Swift have all released projects that span more than 30 tracks — something which rarely happened in the days of CDs and cassettes, given those formats' physical limitations. Major artists are also trying to capture attention in the age of “content oversupply” by releasing alternate versions of albums and songs, and more remixes than ever. last year (including sped up, slowed down, a capella, extended, and instrumental variations), five versions of “we can't be friends (wait for your love),” five versions of “the boy is mine” and six versions of the album those songs are on, eternal sunshine. Over the last year, Swift, for example, released 36 different vinyl editions of varying colors and contents of The Tortured Poets Department to continue to engage fans and to further its monetary (and chart) success. In the end, for artists and their teams, there's no strong downside to any of these marketing strategies on social media, streaming services or physical products, and thus, they're likely to persist and keep growing. It's true that constant promotion can wear out fans. I've seen it from time to time, especially with excessive vinyl variants, but really, with fans' attention being pulled in so many directions at every moment, how many of them will notice just how big all the promotion has become? Streaming services have started to take the effects of saturation seriously — Spotify is now curbing mass uploads and SoundCloud is de-monetizing AI tracks — but that's not enough to stop the flood, especially not as AI music and content creation surges. Deezer reported last week that 18% of its daily uploaded songs are now fully AI-generated, nearly double the count it reported in January. Sora, meanwhile, became so popular after its release in December that, a few days later, it had to pause users' ability to make new accounts, citing extremely high demand. Surely, there's some limit to how hard the music business can push these pro-saturation tactics. But I also believe this might just be the new state of the internet, where the rise of AI tools are making it easier to flood online platforms with various forms of content. Will the “dead internet theory” — the idea that there's so much AI slop and even human-made saturation that nothing can be found or trusted — come to pass, or will music marketers continue to break through the exponentially growing noise by fighting back with even more noise? A daily briefing on what matters in the music industry

After several years and enormous tragedy, the ill-fated Rust will finally be released on Friday. “[Hutchins' family] wanted it completed,” Souza told The Guardian. “I'd been repelled by the thought of going back, but [then] it started to appeal. And I couldn't live with the idea of someone else doing it.” 'Rust' Review: Alec Baldwin Leads a Competent but Uninspired Western Haunted by Death and Scandal That said, Souza quite naturally wishes he could go back in time and have never made the film. Prop armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and is serving an 18-month prison sentence. Baldwin was charged with involuntary manslaughter over this role in the shooting, but the charges were dismissed in December due to mishandled evidence. Souza added that he hasn't watched the actor's recent cringey-cheerful family reality show on Max, The Baldwins, which has generated dismal ratings and audience scores. All told, the resumption of filming was an emotionally difficult time. The Hollywood Reporter‘s review of the film called it, a “no-frills Western, a classic story of cowboys and outlaws that revels in gorgeous scenery and the Puritanical moral dilemmas foundational to much of this nation's mythology. The film is competently made and absorbing at times, but there's a workaday quality that slows its momentum. It's a handsomely made project, but a story about such a complicated set of characters should make us feel more strongly, and Rust struggles to accomplish that.” The review also praises the cineamatography, which was started by Hutchins and completed by Bianca Cline. Starting May 2, Rust is getting a limited theatrical release and will be available to buy for $14.99 to stream online on Apple TV, Prime Video and other video-on-demand platforms. Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day

Bruce Springsteen has released the first song ever from his long-ago shelved soundtrack to Faithless, a film that was never made. Springsteen recorded much of the album in the months after his 2005 Devils & Dust tour concluded. It is one of seven albums to be unvaulted for his new collection Tracks II: The Lost Albums, out June 27. Listen to the title track of Faithless below. “This was a really unusual collection of songs,” Springsteen said in press materials. “You could recognize details and maybe a character or two. But for the most part, I just wrote atmospheric music that I thought would fit.” Among the 11 tracks are four instrumentals, but Springsteen plays and sings solo for much of the record. Ron Aniello produced, and some touring E Street Band members—Soozie Tyrell, Lisa Lowell, Curtis King Jr., Michelle Moore and Ada Dyer—contribute alongside Patti Scialfa and Evan and Sam Springsteen. Pitchfork may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast.

Bruce Springsteen has released the first song ever from his long-ago shelved soundtrack to Faithless, a film that was never made. Springsteen recorded much of the album in the months after his 2005 Devils & Dust tour concluded. It is one of seven albums to be unvaulted for his new collection Tracks II: The Lost Albums, out June 27. Listen to the title track of Faithless below. “This was a really unusual collection of songs,” Springsteen said in press materials. “You could recognize details and maybe a character or two. But for the most part, I just wrote atmospheric music that I thought would fit.” Among the 11 tracks are four instrumentals, but Springsteen plays and sings solo for much of the record. Ron Aniello produced, and some touring E Street Band members—Soozie Tyrell, Lisa Lowell, Curtis King Jr., Michelle Moore and Ada Dyer—contribute alongside Patti Scialfa and Evan and Sam Springsteen. Pitchfork may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast.

We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. Sarah Michelle Gellar is detailing how Academy Award winner Chloé Zhao changed her mind about a “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” reboot. Gellar, who has publicly been against a revival for years, officially is set to reprise her titular role as Buffy Summers for a new Hulu series, with Zhao directing the pilot. “Poker Face” scribes Nora and Lilla Zuckerman are writing the show, which hails from 20th Television and Searchlight TV where Zhao has a first-look deal. Both Gellar and Zhao will executive produce the series, along with original executive producer (and music icon) Dolly Parton. “Buffy” creator and writer Joss Whedon has no involvement in the reboot. “Every pitch I heard was just like, ‘Let's just do “Buffy” again,'” Gellar told Elite Daily of why she finally decided to agree to a revival. “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” aired on the WB for five seasons from 1997 to 2001 before moving to UPN for two more seasons. The series also landed spinoff “Angel” from 1999 to 2004. That's who I want to tell stories for.” And while not much else is known about the revival, Gellar confirmed that any loglines or casting rumors are false. Gellar teased during “The Drew Barrymore Show” in 2024 that she was inspired by other early 2000s revival series to revisit “Buffy.” “It's funny, I always used to say no, because it's in its bubble and it's so perfect,” she said. […] And it makes you realize that in this world, we need those heroes, I think, more so than ever.” In the meantime before “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” 2.0, Zhao was directing “Hamnet” based on Maggie O'Farrell novel about William Shakespeare and his wife Agnes. We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services.

Donald Trump's trade wars with China and other nations are widely expected to cause sharp economic pain, but some experts have warned consumers not to hoard supplies and goods before prices skyrocket, arguing that mass stockpiling could backfire spectacularly. Well, many Americans aren't listening to that advice, according to survey data this year, instead preparing for the possibility of store shelves being bare amid a Trump-inflicted recession. Two Trump administration officials and a Trump aide tell Rolling Stone that they have done some stockpiling of their own in recent weeks or months, and that they know others working in Republican politics — inside and outside of the administration — who are doing the same. One of the Trump officials says they have already run to Target to bulk-buy toilet paper, some types of food, and other household supplies. When asked why they're doing this, the Trump aide — who says they and their partner have done similar household-supply hoarding lately, and are also “stashing cash” reserves in their D.C.-area home — simply replies: “Because it would be stupid not to!” The aide adds that they still believe in Trump's tariffs regime, though, citing the supposed advantage of “short-term pain” in exchange for long-term “prosperity.” But because Trump commands a towering personality cult among the Republican base and rules over his party with catty malice, these GOP bigwigs mostly have to just go along with it and smile. They'll tell the American people one thing (Trump's got this, they'll claim), and behave privately another way (hoarding toilet tissue for themselves, and occasionally trying to talk the president off his Peter Navarro-shaped ledge). Nobody — not even Trump, it seems — knows how long this is going to last. consumer confidence plummets to Covid-era low as trade war stokes anxiety,” The Associated Press reported on Tuesday, referencing the last time Trump was in office overseeing a crisis that also involved numerous Americans hoarding toilet paper, amid a supply chain crisis. Kamala Harris Slams Trump's ‘Narrow, Self-Serving Vision of America' in Gala Speech Trump Goes Full Grinch as Tariffs Threaten to Ruin Christmas Pam Bondi Flatters Trump With Claim That 75% of America Would Be Dead If Not for Him As CNN reported on Monday: “A 59 percent majority of the public now says President Donald Trump's policies have worsened economic conditions in the country, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS, up from 51 percent in March and on par with the worst numbers Joe Biden saw during his presidency.” On Tuesday, after it was first reported by Punchbowl News that Amazon planned to “display how much of an item's cost is derived from tariffs — right next to the product's total listed price,” the Trump White House slammed it as a “hostile” act, and a reportedly “pissed” Trump quickly got Amazon founder Jeff Bezos on the phone. He is the ultimate dealmaker,” Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins insisted to a Fox News host, who really did not sound like he was buying what she was selling. In fact, some are openly saying it's a perfectly rational response to the Trump administration's tariff salvos. “We had a pretty good consumer spending report a few days ago, and the hunch is that people are buying in advance of the tariffs; that sounds plausible,” says Stephen Moore, a conservative writer and Project 2025 contributor who has advised Trump on economic matters for years. Consumers are gonna change their behavior based on these things, if it's something that's imported. If Trump starts to get a few of these deals done, then it'll alleviate some of that pressure, but I don't know where they are on that right now.” For years, the president, unlike more traditional Republicans, has viewed massive tariffs as a net positive for the country and as his perfect negotiating tool in high-stakes international trade standoffs. He also believes he can impose his tariff blitzes unilaterally as president, a legally dubious claim that is currently working its way through the courts. “When a country (USA) is losing many billions of dollars on trade with virtually every country it does business with, trade wars are good, and easy to win,” Trump tweeted in 2018, when he was president the first time and toying with trade warfare on a smaller scale than now. “If we continue down this path, I think it's going to be pretty bleak for the economy,” says Marc Short, who once served as Trump's White House legislative affairs director and as a top aide to Mike Pence. “There's likely going to be significant job losses and potential supply problems in your stores. I do think the president is very adept at claiming victory and reversing his policies, so there's a question about how long this actually goes. But if you look at the data on trucking and shipping right now, I think by the end of May, you're going to see more shortages and supply disruptions.” Elon Musk Melts Down Over Report That Tesla Is Considering Replacing Him Pam Bondi Flatters Trump With Claim That 75% of America Would Be Dead If Not for Him Spooked by Trade Wars, Trump Officials Hoard Supplies: ‘It Would Be Stupid Not To!' I think this could mean a lot of Americans — not just White House staff — are out there ordering supplies ahead of what they expect to be a rougher period. But I think there are currently central planners in this White House who think they can control what Americans buy and sell through their trade policies.”

Rallies, marches, town halls, and other direct actions have been increasing over the past month, and today more than a thousand protest events will take place across all 50 states. We the people say no to executive overreach and your flagrant amassing of authority by purging thousands of civil servants so you can fill them with zero-sum loyalists or eliminate their positions entirely under the guise of efficiency. Most fundamental of all, we say no evading checks and balances, the very foundation of how our government has operated since the Constitution you swore to uphold was first ratified. We're saying no to many things the Trump administration is doing, but we are also saying yes to making life in the nation actually great. We know well that times are hard for a huge number of Americans and that many of us feel disempowered: financially, culturally, geographically, you name it. We know, Mr. President, that you tapped into those feelings during the election — after all, who among us doesn't want their government to be more efficient, who doesn't want to feel safe? — and we know that you're a consummate salesman who convinced 77 million people that your leadership was the country's best choice even after you finished your last term as a serial-lying, insurrection-raising, Muslim-banning, family-separating, bankruptcy-filing, hush-money-paying, business-record-falsifying, classified-document-stealing, liable for sexually abusing, abortion-ban-producing, twice-impeached, election-subverting felon. So too, Mr. President, is your flood-the-zone strategy, a blitz of executive orders, announcements, and a daily assault on rights and governance meant to stun and immobilize those of us who oppose your agenda — a strategy we recognize as a page from the classic autocratic playbook that it is. Putting aside the recurrent onslaught and day-to-day chaos of the administration, the massive amount of money allowed in our politics, and even the horribly bungled implementation of so many of your policy rollouts — firing, rehiring, and keeping government workers in limbo; explosive tariff mania that's jacking up prices, started a global trade war, and is sending the stock market zigzagging downward — let's step back and name some of the things we oppose about the first 100 days of your second term. We say no to defying the judiciary by selectively disregarding due process as enshrined in the Constitution, arguing that presidents have absolute powers over the executive branch that the judiciary cannot usurp, filing motions to disqualify judges, and calling for the impeachment of those ruling against your administration, all while disregarding court orders that conflict with your agenda. We say no to your shameful efforts to erase transgender identity, so often by hiding behind the fig leaf of religious freedom. We are all your administration's constituents, Mr. President, and ostracizing any of us is an attack against all of us. From blocking new passports for trans and nonbinary Americans to trying to ban transgender people from serving in the military and from your housing trans women in male prisons to erasing trans history and public health data from government websites, we say no. We say no to withdrawing from the Paris Agreement, the landmark global initiative to address the climate crisis and reduce greenhouse gas emissions signed by every nation on Earth except Yemen, Libya, and Iran. We say no to your doubling down on fossil fuels, to rolling back fuel economy standards, and to ending requirements that big polluters disclose how much carbon dioxide and other planet-warming gases they emit. We do not approve of your canceling $20 billion in climate grants, ending climate standards on household appliances, and moving to repeal dozens of the nation's most significant environmental regulations. We say no to walking away from our allies and fostering an adversarial relationship with the European Union. While nobody is advocating to keep violent criminal migrants in the country, many of us draw a distinction between civil removal proceedings and criminal prosecutions, and we say no to your firing immigration judges when there's a backlog of cases. But what's really galling is the cruelty, lawlessness, and overreach of your crackdown. We say no to deporting anyone without due process. We also say no to terminating diversity, equity, and inclusion programs across the federal government, to blaming DEI for the deadly midair collision over the Potomac in January, and to withholding federal funding from states and districts with diversity programs in their public schools orders that are designed to ensure equal opportunity for all — and we say yes to equal access to jobs, housing, health care, and education for everybody. When it comes to our nation's health, we say no to withdrawing from the World Health Organization (again), no to gutting the National Institutes of Health to the tune of 1,300 fired workers, no to terminating employees and active research grants at the National Science Foundation, as well as your canceling $2 billion in federal research grants that include clinical trials for Alzheimer's disease and cancer. These are the things that affect our lives and loved ones. So we are going to keep saying no to extensive staff reductions that include scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Environmental Protection Agency, and no to the Department of Health and Human Services abruptly discontinuing $11.4 billion in state grants used to track infectious diseases and to support mental health services, addiction treatment, and other urgent health issues. As for institutions, we say no to your freezing, reducing, and eliminating billions of dollars in funding to an ever-widening group of universities in federal grants and contracts because you don't like their politics. But bullying exceptional schools with lists of demands based on your ideology is unacceptable. Beyond universities, we say no to your vengeful targeting of political opponents and threatening perceived enemies including law firms, news organizations, television networks, former officials, and cultural institutions like the Kennedy Center. Elon Musk Melts Down Over Report That Tesla Is Considering Replacing Him Pam Bondi Flatters Trump With Claim That 75% of America Would Be Dead If Not for Him Spooked by Trade Wars, Trump Officials Hoard Supplies: ‘It Would Be Stupid Not To!' By coming together, being creative, fighting back against your creeping authoritarianism masquerading as American exceptionalism, and insisting on better choices and sorely lacking congressional oversight as we move forward, we the people will indeed ensure the nation's greatness, Mr. President. Send us a tip using our anonymous form. Rolling Stone is a part of Penske Media Corporation.

Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter The L.A.-set heist movie also stars Mark Ruffalo, Barry Keoghan, Monica Barbaro, Corey Hawkins, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Nick Nolte. By Pamela McClintock Senior Film Writer Chris Hemsworth and Halle Berry‘s heist movie Crime 101 has landed a high-profile release date in theaters. Amazon MGM Studios will open the film Feb. 13, the beginning of the long Valentine's Day and Presidents' Day weekend. Directed by Bart Layton, Crime 101 is based on author Don Winslow's novella of the same name. The story follows detective Lou Lubesnick as he attempts to solve a string of multimillion-dollar jewel heists by tracking the perpetrator who follows a strict set of rules known as “Crime 101.” As the fates of the various characters converge, the line between hunter and hunted blurs. Layton wrote the adapted script. Related Video Mark Ruffalo, Barry Keoghan, Monica Barbaro, Corey Hawkins, Tate Donovan, Devon Bostick, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Nick Nolte round out the cast. Working Title produced Crime 101 alongside The Story Factory, RAW and Wild State. Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day Send us a tip using our anonymous form.