WME’s Dan Limerick on Megamergers and Tech Giants in Hollywood

For WME chief working officer Dan Limerick, consolidation in Hollywood gave approach to the tech giants which have encroached upon the territory traditionally held by legacy media.

Limerick, who joined The Hollywood Reporter co-editor-in-chief Maer Roshan on Wednesday in a keynote dialog at THR’s annual Energy Enterprise Managers occasion, introduced by Metropolis Nationwide Financial institution, likened the present state of the leisure business to the 2000s in the course of the top of broadcast TV that began to see incumbents gobble up opponents.

“Instances like this give rise to tech,” he mentioned.

By his pondering, the shift isn’t all that unhealthy. He noticed that the businesses that at the moment are part of the Hollywood panorama are contributing to fixing the problems that the mergers and acquisitions feeding frenzy triggered. “As we consolidate, there’s a variety of sameness that begins to percolate,” he added. “With a extra various slate of studios to work with, the programming will get higher over time.”

Requested about business contraction, Limerick famous that the tech giants introduced some huge cash into Hollywood and that extra content material is being made now than ever earlier than. On the challenges to greenlighting smaller titles as a result of present state of manufacturing, he mentioned that the company purchasers will “must take a bit much less at occasions to have larger backends.” The WME exec additionally pressured the necessity for heightened information transparency round viewership and engagement to measure what studios worth.

“It’s buyer acquisition, which for them is a giant metric?” he questioned. “Is it the variety of views. I don’t know there’ll ever be a typical understanding… On the finish of the day, we wish purchasers paid when content material is profitable. Proper now, it’s a black field.”

Tech firms which have made their approach into the leisure business in recent times embrace Apple, which launched its personal manufacturing arm and has been spending massive cash creating content material, and Amazon, which purchased MGM Studios in 2022 and has discovered a distinct segment in producing small to mid-budget titles. The settlement to purchase a controlling stake in Nationwide Amusements, the corporate that controls Paramount International, by David Ellison’s Skydance is predicted to shut subsequent yr.

These transactions additional consolidated a shrinking pool of content material patrons which have caught the eyes of regulators and Hollywood’s unions. Disney’s collection of acquisitions — Pixar, Marvel, Lucasfilm and others — have led to ramped up costs for its streaming providers, additional vertically built-in the corporate, pushed creatives to surrender income from future licensing of their TV content material and “decreased output and innovation,” per a 2023 report from the Writers Guild of America. Netflix, in the meantime, as soon as helped to advertise a aggressive atmosphere however is “now utilizing its place as the biggest streaming service on the earth to abuse its leverage as an employer, lower revolutionary content material spending and lift costs for shoppers,” the report alleged.

In October, Disney shut down its ABC Signature TV studio within the second such transfer by a media conglomerate this month. The reorganization features a merging of scripted growth groups at ABC and Hulu.

There are penalties to firms that take satisfaction in disrupting the established order changing into main gamers in Hollywood, Limerick mentioned. Prompted by Roshan to share his ideas on the scuffle between OpenAI and Scarlett Johansson, he pointed to the emergence of generative synthetic instruments that pilfer WME purchasers’ likenesses and works earlier than calling for laws to be handed that accounts for such theft. He handed on echoing criticism of Sam Altman by Ari Emanuel, who mentioned that the OpenAI founder is a “con man” on the Aspen Concepts Pageant in June.

“I additionally suppose it’s going to [stay] right here,” Limerick continued. “The winners are going to be these which can be ready to make use of it successfully to do what we do in inventive endeavors.”

On Warner Bros. Discovery, the WME exec mentioned that chief government David Zaslav has a “powerful job” in “attempting to navigate a world that’s gotten a lot larger.” He added, “They’ve a extremely sturdy library and historical past and model.”

The Q&A ended a breakfast at Spago Beverly Hills celebrating Hollywood’s High Enterprise Managers. THR co-editor-in-chief Nekesa Mumbi Moody kicked off a lineup of audio system that included THR president Joe Shields and JaHan Wang, government vp leisure banking for Metropolis Nationwide Financial institution.

This yr’s Enterprise Supervisor Icon honoree was John McILwee, founding father of J. McILwee & Associates, Inc. He’s appeared a number of occasions on THR‘s high Enterprise Managers lists and counts Jane Lynch, Matt Reeves, Kevin Costner, Maura Tierney, Chris Olsen and Kerry Condon as purchasers.

Lynch introduced McILwee the award. She emphasised his unrelenting optimism and work ethic, plus him being the “largest identify dropper I’ve ever met.”

She added, “He carpe diems the shit out of life. However what I really like most about John is that once I current him with one thing that actually confounds me, which is simple to do, he says to me straightforward peasy.”

On the rostrum, McILwee attributed his success within the business to creating win-win conditions at any time when attainable. “A profitable negotiation doesn’t imply another person has to lose,” he defined.

And within the speech that drew loads of laughs from the gang, which included Richard Weisz, he concluded with, “When are we going to get our personal IMDB class?”