From a Los Angeles magazine story by Alex Bhattacharji headlined “THR Broke Some of the Industry’s Biggest Stories. Then a Pair of Movie Producers Took Over”:
Lionsgate’s pre-Golden Globes party, held at the Chateau Marmont the night before the January awards ceremony, was an event designed to elicit maximum buzz. It succeeded: As the booze flowed and the smell of weed wafted through the air, actors, filmmakers, and execs mingled and made nice with the many members of the press. Among the stars in attendance were Daniel Craig, Ana de Armas, and Chris Evans, the stars of Knives Out, which Lionsgate had released with film and TV production house Media Rights Capital. . . .At one point during the evening, Knives Out director Rian Johnson told an editor for The Hollywood Reporter—the trade magazine that shares a parent company with MRC—that he was already working on a sequel. . . .In an exclusive posted online early the next day, THR reported: This “could be the beginning of a lucrative franchise.”. . .
Soon after the THR story went public, the title took on new meaning as MRC eviscerated the paper’s editors for publishing the piece. A company executive confronted THR editorial director Matt Belloni at the Globes. The complaint: THR shouldn’t have reported news about the possible sequel ahead of an official announcement.
The episode was regarded by THR editors as another sign that the top executives at Valence, the entertainment company that owns THR and MRC as well as music industry paper Billboard and Dick Clark Productions, was ignorant or disdainful of the most basic tenets of journalism. In an industry in which conflicts of interest abound, The Hollywood Reporter, once the least savory of the industry’s trade publications, had spent the better part of a decade—and many millions of dollars—building up a reputation for independence and propriety. But last April, after a series of incursions into the publication’s editorial affairs culminated in Belloni announcing his departure, its reputation was in doubt.
If anyone was aware that hard-hitting journalism could force a person out of a job, it was Belloni, a 14-year THR veteran who ascended to the top of the masthead in 2017. Under his leadership, the magazine published a piece by Kim Masters detailing sexual harassment allegations against Amazon Studios chief Roy Price, who resigned five days later, and a sex-for-casting exposé, cowritten by Masters and Tatiana Siegel, that led to the resignation of Warner Bros. CEO Kevin Tsujihara. So when the publication’s dogged reporting cost Belloni his own job, there were many Hollywood heavyweights who were happy to see him go.
As it turned out, the contretemps over Knives Out was not Belloni’s first battle with MRC’s brass. According to sources close to the situation, top executives at Valence repeatedly sought to soften or interdict THR’s coverage of the people and companies doing business with Valence. . . .
When Belloni resisted, tensions mounted. In a remarkable mid-March video conference call with the editorial team and a moderator from the journalism nonprofit the Poynter Institute, Belloni laid out a long list of incidents of Valence’s interference and alleged attempts to ax stories. . . .A little more than three weeks later, Belloni was gone. . . .
MRC’s recent staff cuts purged the magazine of some of its most prolific writers. Valence insists the cuts were spurred solely by bottom-line concerns. Aggressive reporting is time-consuming and costly. Complicating any reckoning, insiders say, is the fact Valence offered free advertising to MRC and partners—including numerous pages to Lionsgate during awards season to promote Knives Out. According to sources close to the company, MRC execs would dangle the promise of free advertising to help close production and distribution deals, like a gift with purchase (sources at MRC deny this.)
More troubling than their attempts to tame THR is the possibility its parent company might point the magazine’s fangs at its corporate rivals and foes. Wiczyk has previously pushed information to editors that could be seen as an effort to drive negative coverage. Notably he gave staff detailed, highly academic presentations about Netflix’s lack of transparency in the platform’s viewership reporting. It’s a legitimate issue, and one that’s been raised by THR and other outlets. However the effort seemed curious to editors, who were aware that Wiczyk bore an unspecified grudge against Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos dating back to the early days of the streamer’s House of Cards. . . .
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