Good morning: In today's edition of The Industry, we look at:
Tarantino’s role, Paramount’s cuts, and a Trash Mountain.
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Quentin Tarantino steps in front of the camera for the first time in decades.
He will join the European drama Only What We Carry, playing John Percy, an old friend of Julian (Simon Pegg), whose return unearths buried truths. The introspective drama, filmed in Normandy, comes from writer-director Jamie Adams (She is Love).
Tarantino reportedly accepted the part after his agent pitched it as a perfect fit. With him playing opposite Pegg, it’s easy to see him fitting into the “shitty friend” overstays his welcome type. But this being drama, it could have a heavier twist.
This is, of course, not the first time he’s been on camera. He’s had notable parts in most of his works, a small bit in Reservoir Dogs (clip), and one of the most iconic scenes, in a film filled with iconic scenes, as Samuel Jackson’s pissed off friend in Pulp Fiction (clip).
But aside from that, QT had some other bit parts like this particularly funny monologue in 1994’s Sleep with Me (giving the wackiest review of Top Gun). But his last major role was from a vampire movie that he wrote but gave to his friend Robert Rodriguez to direct, From Dusk Till Dawn. Clip.
Throughout his brief but notable time acting, there’s a genuine sense of ‘yeah, that’s Tarantino.’ He acts completely naturally and how he would react in situations, obviously, he chews through his own words with decadence and care, but he almost seems to play a hyperbolic version of himself, adding to the lore and interconnected characters throughout his surprisingly deep mythos (see: Red Apple Cigarettes).
Dusk Till Dawn was the only major character work you saw from him, playing off George Clooney. He played a meeker but still psychotic version of himself with his calm, understated demeanor, only acting to further his unhinged persona.
How will his wisecracking translate to a drama? Honestly, no idea, but I feel like it’s plausible to expect the unexpected. There are a lot of directors who wouldn’t dare cross the threshold or might even find it beneath them, but Tarantino is versatile enough to give it a try.
THE INDUSTRY TLDR
Paramount lays off 1,000 U.S. employees (≈5.5% of staff).
Showrunner Erin Foster follows Netflix’s Nobody Wants This with a Hulu romcom.
Scrubs reboot loses co-showrunner. Aseem Batra now runs the series solo.
Closer Media hires Joanna Korshak and Whitney Dibo as SVPs of Production.
Taylor Sheridan’s NBCU deal is worth $1bn.
Only Murders in the Building may move to London for Season 6.
Amazon’s Lauren Anderson transitions to a new brand partnerships role.
Murray Bartlett joins Netflix’s All the Sinners Bleed.
Björn Andrésen (Death in Venice) dies at 70.
All Day & All Night, starring Josh Hartnett, launches at AFM via XYZ Films.
Poor Boy, starring Guy Pearce and Teresa Palmer, launches at AFM.
Kris Rey directs Trash Mountain, starring Zooey Deschanel.
Magnolia Pictures acquires The Napa Boys.
Aura Entertainment acquires Wildcat (Kate Beckinsale).
Cohen Media Group picks up Poland’s Franz (fka Kafka).
Srijit Mukherji to direct Elementary, My Dear Holmes.
THE INDUSTRY NEWS
Layoffs at Paramount, a Skydance Company, have started. The now merged company has let go of 1000 of its domestic workforce (5.5% of staff).
It’s our understanding that another 1000 people will be laid off across all departments.
CEO David Ellison is also looking to use these cuts to save around $2bn.
Skydance’s staff is less than 2000 people total, and we expect many will be replacing their counterparts at Paramount.
In other layoff news, Amazon is cutting 30,000 jobs. No word on how this will affect Prime and Amazon MGM Studios.
Tidbits:
Amid the success of Erin Foster’s Netflix hit Nobody Wants This, she is already working on her next romcom series. The untitled series for Hulu is set around a lavish destination wedding to be told over one long weekend, written by Foster and Adam Countee (EP: Severance). The show will be produced by 20th Television with Foster’s Fatigue Sisters under their overall deal, with Hulu pre-emptively acquiring it to keep the project in-house.
As ABC’s Scrubs reboot nears, series co-showrunner Tim Hobert has left the series. The other, Aseem Batra, will take on the role solo in addition to having also written the opening episode for the medical comedy’s reboot. The new Scrubs show was slated to begin airing late 2025-early 2026 with no official date announced.
Production and finance outfit Closer Media (Won’t You Be My Neighbor?) has hired Joanna Korshak and Whitney Dibo as SVPs of Production in the company’s effort to expand its scripted output. Since its launch in 2021, Closer has focused on landing primarily documentaries with Korshak, a former Fifth Season exec, and Dibo, Anonymous Content’s previous VP of Film and Television.
Vancouver’s Park Theatre isn’t going anywhere. Originally opened in 1941, the famous theater will no longer close its doors as scheduled with help from some high-profile investors like Sean Baker (dir. Anora), Osgood Perkins (dir. Longlegs), Mike Flanagan (dir. The Life of Chuck), and Stranger Things’ Finn Wolfhard.
It’s a good day for arthouse cinemas. The closed since 2005 Metro Theater on the Upper West Side in NYC is being revived as the Uptown Film Center with a $29M investment. Essentially, the idea is to have an art house cinema north of Lincoln Center. Opening in 2028. This is the brainchild of Ira Deutchman (president: UWS Cinema Center).
Goodbye America, hello Europe! Hulu’s Only Murders in the Building may be heading to London for its sixth season. This news comes before an official renewal, yet with the finale dropping tonight, it seems almost guaranteed the hit ensemble-led comedy will be back for another chapter.
Mini Tidbits:
Taylor Sheridan’s deal to leave Paramount for NBCUniversal will net him $1bn. Read our full breakdown here.
Cinemark is expanding its partnership with IMAX, adding three new 70mm film projection systems and four IMAX with Laser systems in the U.S. in Chicago, Colorado Springs, and Rochester in time for Nolan’s Odyssey (release: July 17, 2026).
NASCAR and acclaimed sports doc producers Words + Pictures (The Last Dance) are teaming on Rising, a five-part docuseries. The series follows new drivers during their 2025 season. Premieres Nov. 17–21 on YouTube, then airs on FS1.
Motion Picture Association Canada sees the exit of president Wendy Noss. Previously the director of government affairs, Noss has been with MPA since 2006 and will remain in her role until a replacement is found.
Amazon’s previous Head of Brand and Content Innovation, Lauren Anderson, is taking on a new role in the company’s unscripted TV division. She will transition into a new role focused on Amazon MGM Studios’ partnerships with brands.
Trailers:
Paramount+’s Little Disasters
Cast: Diane Kruger
Release date: Dec 11
Apple TV+’s Hijack (S2)
Release: Jan 14, 2026
Night Creatures
Trailer (Flemish w/ English subtitles)
International Sales Rep: Picture Tree (Rosemead)
Launching at AFM
Prime’s Paul McCartney: Man on the Run
Dir: Morgan Neville (Piece by Piece)
Release: Feb 2026
THE ACTOR SPOTLIGHT
Would Sydney Sweeney make a good Bond girl?
Right now, this casting idea is just a rumor. But the idea is worth exploring as Jeff Bezos is supposedly pushing for this to happen.
The first strike against Sweeney is that she’s US-born (the majority of Bond girls are non-American). The last US-born Bond girl was Halle Berry’s Jinx.
On pure talent, Sweeney would have no problem playing the role. She’s got an electric on-camera presence, as evidenced in the recent Christy. And she has a vulnerability in the underseen HBO’s Reality (2023) that could complete a nice character arc (a la Eva Green in Casino Royale).
Tidbits:
Emmy-winning Australian actor Murray Bartlett (The White Lotus s1) is joining Netflix’s All the Sinners Bleed. The limited series is based on S.A. Cosby’s acclaimed thriller novel of the same name that follows a Black sheriff who is tasked with hunting down a serial killer preying on his small religious town. Bartlett will play the town’s board of supervisors chairman, Scott Cunningham, his first time bringing a character from a novel to life. Filming is ongoing.
Florian Munteanu cast to star alongside Walton Goggins and Amber Midthunder (Prey) in Painter, an action film marking stunt coordinator Garrett Warren’s feature directorial debut for 20th Century Studios. The film follows a skilled fighter (Midthunder) rescuing her kidnapped father (Goggins). EP’d by James Cameron, production begins in Serbia this month.
Ken Leung (Industry, Lost) has joined Lucy Liu (Elementary, Kill Bill Vol. 1) in Peacock’s upcoming crime drama Superfakes, created by Alice Ju (Beef, Poker Face). The series follows a Chinatown counterfeit dealer (Liu) who enters the black-market underworld to fund her family’s suburban life, with Leung playing her husband. Produced by A24 and UCP, with the Safdie brothers EP.
Mini Tidbit:
Swedish actor and musician Björn Andrésen has passed away at 70. He became known worldwide for his role in Luchino Visconti’s 1971 film adaptation of Death in Venice (clip). After leaving acting for most of his career, Andréson had a small (but brutal) part in Ari Aster’s horror Midsommar (2019).
Peacock’s Bel-Air sees yet another familiar face. The spinoff series’ fourth and final upcoming season announces Janet Hubert will join the cast, not reprising her role as The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air’s no-nonsense Aunt Viv (scene), but as a new character. Hubert will play an older “wise woman” with the season premiere on Nov. 24th.
Aidan Laprete (The Pitt), Kelley Pereira (The Runarounds), and Nelson Franklin (Veep) join Aaron Sorkin’s The Social Reckoning, the long-awaited sequel to The Social Network.
FESTIVALS AND DOCS
Two great projects headed to AFM:
All Day & All Night
Star: Josh Hartnett
Dir: Tommy Wirkola (Violent Night)
Genre: Action Thriller
Prod Co/Financier: XYZ Films
Synopsis:
Follows a reformed bank robber who returns to crime to pay for his daughter’s Harvard tuition, accidentally ending up on a reality TV show while evading both police and mobsters.
Poor Boy
Cast: Guy Pearce, Teresa Palmer & Ann Dowd
Genre: Supernatural Thriller
Worldwide sales rep: AMP (Shelby Oaks)
Synopsis:
A seven-year-old survives a deadly accident but wakes up claiming he’s a man who died years earlier. Two families grapple with the mystery of whether his shocking revelation is a miracle or something darker.
It really has hints of Jonathan Glazer’s Birth.
Mini Tidbit:
Sundance Institute Workers (40 people) are hoping to unionize. They have asked that Sundance voluntarily recognize their union by Halloween.
INDIE FILMMAKER SPOTLIGHT
Kris Rey’s sixth feature is not a trash mountain. Ok, Trash Mountain is the title, but the cast and team are sensational:
Dir/Wri: Kris Rey
Cast: Zooey Deschanel, Kyle Marvin (Splitsville)
Producer: Colin Trevorrow (Dir: Safety Not Guaranteed, Jurassic World)
EP: Lilly Wachowski
EP: Sight Unseen (Prod Co: Rental Family)
Synopsis:
Follows a young gay man living in Chicago who returns to his hometown in Missouri following the death of his hoarder father.
It’s not surprising this is Chicago-set. Rey has been embedded in the Chicago indie mumblecore scene since the start (she was formerly married to Joe Swanberg).
She’s had a massive career of her own, kicking off her debut with SXSW’s It Was Great, But I Was Ready to Come Home (2009). And recently, the uplifting and wacky I Used to Go Here (2020) starring Gillian Jacobs.
Magnolia Pictures has acquired…
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