Good morning: In today's edition of The Industry, we look at:
Netflix is Out There, AMC’s dead walk, and a Nest.
Let’s go!
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THE INDUSTRY TLDR
Shawn Levy lines up Netflix sci-fi original Somewhere Out There.
AMC Global Media Q1 revenue and ad losses continue as they look to license The Walking Dead.
Netflix expands the Money Heist universe.
Paramount execs will earn major payouts if the WBD acquisition closes.
Village Roadshow pays Warner Bros. $57M after its Matrix Resurrections dispute.
Renée Zellweger, Sissy Spacek, and Mia Threapleton lead A Woman in the Sun.
Jonathan Bailey joins cycling-world psychological thriller Pumping Black.
Gerard Butler saves the World Cup in The Nest.
Netflix’s Adolescence wins big at the BAFTA TV Awards.
Pamela Anderson has a new film at the Cannes Market.
Focus Features picks up international rights to Sundance’s The Incomer.
Kristen Stewart EPs Barbara Hammer doc Barbara Forever, acquired by Strand.
Yesterday’s correct answer: Charlize Theron won an Oscar for Monster.
82% got it right.
THE INDUSTRY NEWS
Shawn Levy is set to direct the new Netflix sci-fi original film Somewhere Out There, having finished production of his latest Star Wars feature Starfighter.
The film will follow a grieving father who, after losing his wife, starts communicating with someone from outer space.
Levy has obviously had a ton of success in the action comedy space with Deadpool & Wolverine (2024) and Free Guy (2021), and his films like The Adam Project (2022) and Real Steel (2011) aim for more emotional stories. The latter two, though, are tough, and perfect examples of how a macro sci-fi concept can easily cloud more resonant intimate story lines.
We hope this out-of-this-world film will stay as grounded as possible. Recently, that’s what made Project Hail Mary so good.
Tidbits:
AMC Global Media (previously called AMC Networks) Q1 2026 revenue losses, compared with last year:
$542M revenue
↓ 2%
$112.8M ad revenue
↓ 5%
$174M streaming revenue
↑ 11%
$18.9M net loss
vs. $18M net loss last year
10.1M streaming subs
↓ 300K since last quarter
This was the seventh quarter in a row that revenue and ad revenue declined. The bright side: streaming revenue is up 11% to $174M, the largest revenue component for the Domestic Operations segment.
Also, The Walking Dead is on sale. AMC Global Media is close to making a deal that will allow other companies to use their household IP, while keeping a share by being co-exclusive.
One for the money. Two for the show. Netflix is expanding the universe of Money Heist, beyond:
The Original (5 parts)
From Tokyo to Berlin (2 seasons)
Money Heist: Korea - Joint Economic Area (1 season)
Berlin and the Lady With an Ermine (1 season)
Berlin and the Jewels of Paris (1 season)
Money Heist: The Phenomenon (2020 doc)
Here’s the trailer for the expanded universe.
The Paramount execs are set to make a small fortune if their WBD acquisition closes:
$150M - David Ellison (CEO)
$38M - Andy Gordon (CSO)
$25M - Makan Delrahim (CLO)
This will come in the form of cash/stock. However, it still pales in comparison to WBD CEO David Zaslav’s projected $887M take if the deal closes. Full filing here.
Mini Tidbits:
Final verdict. Village Roadshow has now paid $57M to Warner Bros., money it owes after withholding its share of the Matrix Resurrections budget due to a COVID dispute. Read more about Village Roadshow’s Bankruptcy and Why It’s Important to the Film Industry.
As Sony Pictures’ international business affairs shifts from L.A. to London, longtime exec Cheryl Lynch is leaving the company. No longer director of SPT subsidiaries like Left Bank (prod co: The Crown), Lynch will exit over the summer as part of a wider restructuring.
Two early-stage projects:
Greg Mottola (Superbad) is a frontrunner to direct DC’s untitled Deathstroke and Bane film. Mottola is already within the DC Studios’ family, having directed a few eps of Peacemaker.
Guillermo del Toro’s alleged next production is a stop-motion adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s fantasy novel The Buried Giant. While not confirmed, the atmospheric story is set in a world where a mysterious mist is giving people amnesia. Definitely resembles something Del Toro would take on.
Two disputes have been resolved:
The most recent court filing has confirmed that Blake Lively will receive no financial payout following the settlement between her and Justin Baldoni’s production company, Wayfarer Studios (It Ends With Us).
After 3 months of striking, WGA West reached a tentative agreement that gives staff members a minimum four percent salary increase.
Obit:
Tony Amatullo, the producer and location manager behind classics like The Goonies (1985), and The Color Purple (1985), dies at 76.
Greenlit:
NBC’s Sunset P.I.
Cast: Jake Johnson
NBC’s Newlyweds
Cast: Tim Daly, Jamie Lee Curtis
NBC’s Rockford Files reboot
NBC’s Line of Fire
Renewals:
ABC’s R.J. Decker (Renewed for S2)
Teaser:
The Easy Kind
Dir: Katy Chevigny (Dick Johnson is Dead)
Cast: Elizabeth Cook
Release: June 3
Pacifico (Spanish sci-fi)
Cannes Market
The Meltdown (Chilean mystery)
Dir: Manuela Martelli (The Future)
Premiere: Cannes, Un Certain Regard
Cantona
Eric Cantona documentary
First Look:
The Man I Love
Dir: Ira Sachs (Passages)
Cast: Rami Malek, Tom Sturridge
Cannes Premiere: May 20
Vertical’s newly acquired Pendulum
Cast: Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Dir/Wri: Mark Heyman (Writer: Black Swan)
Prod: Darren Aronofsky
Release Dates:
Disney’s Untitled Oasis Documentary
Dir: Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders)
Cast: Noel Gallagher, Liam Gallagher
Release: Sept 11
Vertical’s Time of Death
Cast: Michael Kelly, Kevin Pollak, Mena Suvari
Release: June 12
Shoot Dates:
Paramount Pictures’ A Quiet Place: Part III
Shooting: May 11 ~ TBD
Release: July 30, 2027
THE ACTOR SPOTLIGHT
Sissy Spacek’s renaissance. She will star alongside Renée Zellweger and promising young actress Mia Threapleton (The Phoenician Scheme) in A Woman in the Sun.
The multi-generational drama follows a Nantucket bartender whose already fragile life begins to unravel after her mother gets sick and her daughter unexpectedly returns home over the course of one emotionally chaotic month.
The casting brings together three generations of actresses at all different points in their careers. A quick turnaround for the famously selective Spacek, who just appeared as Jennifer Lawrence’s kooky mother-in-law in last fall’s Die, My Love, and Zellweger, who just starred in the fourth installment of her romcom-led franchise, Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy.
Threapleton joins the Oscar winners in one of her biggest roles yet, following her impressively captivating job leading Wes Anderson’s whimsical espionage comedy The Phoenician Scheme (2025, scene).
The directorial debut of Nyad writer Julia Cox, Black Bear, and Artist Equity are launching sales for A Woman in the Sun at the Cannes market.
From blockbuster leading man to Fresh director Mimi Cave’s newest muse, Jonathan Bailey (Wicked) has been cast in Pumping Black. Set alongside Natalie Portman, in her first role since 2023’s May December, the psychological thriller is set in the cutthroat, adrenaline-fueled world of professional cycling.
Bailey will play an aging cyclist who falls under the wing of a power-hungry doctor as things take a dark turn in the lead-up to the Tour de France.
The film has clear Black Swan (2010) references, a story centered on obsession, control, and athletes destroying themselves in pursuit of perfection. While familiar territory to Portman, Pumping Black feels like a major shift for Bailey, just coming off box office hits Wicked: For Good and Jurassic World: Rebirth.
Production will begin this fall with Anton (Fuze) launching international sales at Cannes.
Tidbits:
Gerard Butler is saving the World Cup. Gerard Butler will star in Thunder Road’s (Producer: John Wick) new action-thriller film, The Nest. He is set to play a sniper who must save his family and 70,000 fans at a World Cup stadium when an anonymous threat comes through the radio. Butler’s career as an action star has been growing over the past decade with films like the Has Fallen franchise, Den of Thieves (2018), and Plane (2023).
Nicholas Pinnock goes Bare. Pinnock, who was the only one in Amazon’s Hedda that had a chance of going tit for tat with Tessa Thompson, has been added to the already stacked cast of Bare. A raw, personal true story of a stripper, lover, and drug addict, turned Sundance documentarian. Other cast includes Colin Firth and Isla Fisher.
Mini Tidbit:
Imogen Poots (Vivarium) and John Reynolds (Oh, Hi!) to star in Amazon Prime’s series Sex Criminals. Based on the comic book of the same name, the show will follow Suze (Poots) and Jon (Reynolds), who can stop time when they are having sex, trying to rob a bank. Kumail Nanjiani (The Big Sick) is the showrunner and also appears in the series.
The SAG-AFTRA president is back at acting. Sean Astin (The Lord of the Rings) has taken his first starring role since winning the presidency with indie film Scruggs. The film will reimagine Charles Dickens’ novel A Christmas Carol with modern characters as we follow a greedy real-estate mogul named Edward Scruggs.
Michael Pennington, most famous for his role as Death Star Commander Moff Jerjerrod in Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, dies at 82. Pennington was a longtime member of the Royal Shakespeare Company and had more than 70 screen roles during his long career.
FESTIVALS AND DOCS
Netflix’s Adolescence wins big at the BAFTA TV Awards. It took home the Best Limited Drama, Best Actor (Stephen Graham), Best Supporting Actor (Owen Cooper), and Best Supporting Actress (Christine Tremarco). Full list of winners here.
Cannes Market additions:
Iron Ribbon w/ an Enemy actor
Driver w/ a Peaky Blinders star
Synergy Systems w/ Forte, Haddish, and André
All those projects + Pamela Anderson here.
Mini Tidbits:
Monia Chokri, Québécois actress, director, and screenwriter, has been named president of the jury for the Cannes Film Festival’s Caméra d’Or prize. The award is given to a debut feature across the official selection as well as in the Critics’ Week and Directors’ Fortnight sections.
Werner Herzog’s Bucking Fastard, starring Rooney and Kate Mara playing sisters for the first time in a film, will not be playing at Cannes. It was offered a spot in a non-competitive category, so Herzog declined.
INDIE FILMMAKER SPOTLIGHT / INTERNATIONAL NEWS
Sundance’s The Incomer, starring Domhnall Gleeson, is acquired by Focus Features for International. This is Focus’s first acquisition from Sundance, even though they brought one film to the festival (The AI Doc: Or How I Became an Apocaloptimist).
The Incomer is a wacky and playful, but ultimately biting story about the conservation of your inner spirit.
Releasing later this year. Want to learn more about the film? At Sundance, we interviewed the EP, Moby.
Director Carlos López Estrada (Blindspotting) and his Antigravity Academy have chosen six new filmmakers and their feature projects for his Screenwriters Camp, an incubator to help emerging directors bring their script to the screen. Among the projects is Chloe Jury-Fogel’s Cherry, which follows an intimacy-fearing preschool teacher who has an unexpected relationship with her pregnant neighbor. Past graduates of Estrada’s Screenwriters Camp have gone on to secure representation, enter pre-production, and advance through programs like the Sundance Institute’s Labs.
Mini Tidbits:
Kristen Stewart Forever
Magenta’s Lice
Uri Singer’s In the Blue
All those tidbits and more here.
ON THIS DAY
1964. Tim Blake Nelson born in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Written by Gabriel Miller, Madelyn Menapace and Tony Jaeyeong Jeong.
Editor: Gabriel Miller.
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