What's news: Scott Pelley slammed Bari Weiss in his first post-firing interview. Trump stormed out of an interview with Meet the Press. Dissident Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi is facing another prison sentence. Obsession crossed $200m globally to become Focus' biggest film ever. And Love Island USA S8 is up a whopping 74 percent in viewing minutes over S7. — Abid Rahman
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►🏆 Congrats to all! 🏆 Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, Schmigadoon!, The Lost Boys and Ragtime were the big winners at the 2026 Tony Awards. Best play went to Liberation. Death of a Salesman won the most awards of any production Sunday with six Tonys. The Scott Rudin-produced revival is directed by Joe Mantello and stars Nathan Lane, Laurie Metcalf and Christopher Abbott. Mantello won for best direction, and Metcalf won for lead actress in a play. The winners.
—Snubs, shutouts and surprises. Ragtime and Cats: The Jellicle Ball went into Sunday night’s Tonys ceremony with 11 and nine nominations respectively, and they ended the night with Ragtime in a slight lead with four Tonys to The Jellicle Ball‘s three awards. Ali Louis Bourzgui was the surprise winner of best featured actor in a musical for his role as The Lost Boys‘ charismatic vampire leader. Another notable surprise came in the featured actor in a play category as Becky Shaw‘s Alden Ehrenreich beat out Death of a Salesman‘s Christopher Abbott. The snubs.
—"A strange Broadway season." THR's executive editor of awards coverage Scott Feinberg's dissects Sunday evening's Tony results. Scott's dives into the wins for Hollywood heavyweights like John Lithgow, Alden Ehrenreich and Laurie Metcalf, and theater troupers like Shoshana Bean. The analysis.
—"For the people of Palestine who deserve to live a fruitful life." Ali Louis Bourzgui won his first Tony Award for his role in The Lost Boys, and used his speech to honor the queer community, immigrants and the Palestinian people. “This is dedicated to the beautiful tapestry of immigrant families who make this country really special,” Bourzgui said. The story.
—No such thing as cancel culture. Producer Scott Rudin won a Tony Award for best revival of a play, after leaving the industry amid claims of bad behavior. Rudin received the trophy for his role as the lead producer on the revival of Death of A Salesman. Rudin’s reported bad behavior became public after a THR story detailed multiple claims from Rudin’s former employees of bullying and verbal abuse as well as throwing objects at staff. The story.
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Pelley Excoriates Weiss, Fears for '60 Minutes' |
►"CBS News is on fire." In his first interview since being fired from 60 Minutes last week, Scott Pelley opened up about the events leading up to his dismissal and called for the removal of CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss. Speaking to the NYT, Pelley opened up about last week’s staff turmoil. In the must-watch interview, Pelley excoriated Weiss and Bilton and genuinely feared for the future of 60 Minutes as well as CBS News. The story.
—"Completely out of touch." FCC chair Brendan Carr weighed in on Scott Pelley's acrimonious exit from CBS News. "One of the reasons why trust in media is so low is because many legacy journalists are completely out of touch," Carr wrote Sunday on X. "You could not get away with that behavior at any run of the mill job. It is revealing to see how blind some are to that." The story.
—Skin so thin. A particularly stroppy Donald Trump stormed out of an interview with Meet the Press‘ Kristen Welker on Sunday after she pressed him on claims that the 2020 presidential election was rigged and his skepticism that the votes in California’s current election are not being tallied accurately. During the NBC News interview, Trump was defending his recently announced a nearly $1.8b “anti-weaponization fund” to compensate people who believe they were wrongly targeted by the Biden administration. Last week, the Justice Department said the fund, part of a deal to resolve Trump’s lawsuit against the IRS, would not be moving forward. The story.
—Tears before bedtime. The Spencer Show might get canceled. Los Angeles City Council member Nithya Raman has fully closed the gap on her mayoral rival Spencer Pratt, picking up a net gain of about 32,6000 votes in several fresh tranches of primary ballots released starting Friday. The new total on Sunday night pulled the progressive Democrat ahead of Pratt with 197,000 votes, or 27.1 percent, 3,000 ahead of her upstart rival, who has 26.7 percent of the vote count. About 150,000 votes are still outstanding. The story.
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Inside the Devious Casting Scam Sweeping Hollywood |
►"You’d be perfect for this!" A must-read report from THR's Katie Kilkenny, who reveals that fraudsters are using AI to impersonate top Hollywood casting directors — targeting aspiring actors looking for their big break. The story.
—"It’s the death of a great American industry." Katie Kilkenny reports that emotions spilled over at a gathering of Hollywood workers, union officials and a current FCC commissioner opposed to the planned Paramount Skydance-Warner Bros. merger on Saturday, with some arguing that the mega-merger on top of other recent challenges in the business would mean the “death of Hollywood.” Writers, actors, crew members and small business owners made dire predictions for the proposed $111b transaction at the “Main St. vs. The Merger” town hall at Beverly Hills’ Lumiere Cinema. The recap.
—"We don’t even need studios to greenlight ideas." CAA's Maha Dakhil talked about the “revolution” currently happening in the film business wherein people with talent and drive “are actually really becoming the masters of their destiny." "The people who are working at the highest levels are people who are not just performing in movies or showing up and being hired, but are actually really becoming the masters of their destiny," CAA's managing director and motion picture agent (she counts Tom Cruise among her clients) said while speaking at the Forbes Iconoclast event in New York last week. The story.
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How America Broke the World Cup |
►"A World Cup that’s hostile to the world." At this year’s World Cup, the rest of the globe will not be rooting for Team USA, writes THR's Scott Roxborough. From Iranian players training in Tijuana to $15,000 visa bonds for African fans, the world's biggest sports event arrives as the most politically toxic sporting event in modern history. The story.
—More persecution. Oscar-nominated director Jafar Panahi is facing another prison sentence and a travel ban after an Iranian court upheld its verdict finding him guilty of “propaganda against the regime.” The court upheld an earlier ruling, made in-absentia when the It Was Just An Accident filmmaker was traveling outside Iran to support the awards campaign of It Was Just an Accident, sentencing the director to a year in prison and a two-year travel ban. Panahi is also prohibted from joining political and social groups and associations. The story.
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'Scary Movie' Stuns, 'Masters' Bombs |
►The movies are back, baby! More than a decade after the last installment, Scary Movie has proven its staying power, landing at the top of the weekend box office with an estimated $55m in domestic ticket sales for its debut weekend. Coming in second was the weekend’s other new opening, Masters of the Universe, earning a paltry $29.3m at the domestic box office, followed by A24's Backrooms ($25.9m), and Focus Features’ Obsession ($25.6m). Coming in fifth is Fathom Entertainment’s The Amazing Digital Circus: The Last Act, a theatrical release of the cult Australian adult webseries, which earned a whopping $19.5m at 2,200 locations. The box office report.
—Woof! The world is obsessed with Obsession. Curry Barker’s film has crossed $200m globally, making it Focus' biggest movie of all time. When Focus acquired Obsession out of TIFF for around $15m, no one could have known it would go on to be the Universal-owned specialty label’s top movie of all time, beating out Downton Abbey ($193.3m globally), Nosferatu ($181.8m), Burn After Reading ($164.3m) and Darkest Hour ($150.3m). The story.
—Woof! Woof! In more good news for Universal, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie has crossed $1b at the box office, the first film of 2026 to do so. After this weekend, Galaxy stands at $428.5m at the domestic box office and $571.5m internationally. Galaxy’s predecessor, 2023’s The Super Mario Bros. Movie, earned more than $1.3b at the box office. The story.
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Netflix Film Head Reaffirms Limited Theatrical Strategy
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►"There is a group of filmmakers who still want theatrical. Those are filmmakers that we’ve accepted we just won’t work with." Dan Lin, chairman of Netflix film, opened up about the streamer’s decision to give Greta Gerwig‘s Narnia movie a wide theatrical release in a new profile with the NYT, assuring the outlet that the move was an “exception” and not a hint at its future rollout strategy. The story.
—Get ready for the South Town Cinematic Universe! THR's Borys "SCOOPS!" Kit has the scoop that classic SNK video games Fatal Fury, The Art of Fighting, Metal Slug, Samurai Showdown among others are being adapted into movies, shows, anime and manga with top Hollywood talent including David S. Goyer. The proposed production slate comes from The Arena, the indie production banner formerly known as Arena SNK that launched last year by former studio executive-turned-producer Erik Feig. The story.
—🎭 Touch of class. 🎭 SCOOPS! also has the scoop that British actor Bill Nighy has signed on for a role in Caine, Lionsgate’s John Wick spinoff being directed by martial arts master Donnie Yen. Yen, who appeared as the titular blind assassin in John Wick: Chapter 4, is also toplining the feature, which is now in production in Budapest and Hong Kong. Also on the call sheet are Mason Thames and Dacre Montgomery as well as Rina Sawayama, who is reprising her role as Akira. The story.
—📅 Dated! 📅 Amazon Prime Video has set June 12 for the worldwide streaming premiere of Karuppu, the Tamil fantasy-action hit that has become the Indian industry’s top-grossing Tamil release of 2026 so far. The streaming bow comes about four weeks after the theatrical release and slots into Prime Video’s lineup ahead of Amazon’s Prime Day sales event in India in July. The story.
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NBA, NHL Get Big Ratings Starts for Championship Series |
►Knicks in 4. ABC has aced the first test of its finals week. The network saw big audiences for the opening games of both the NHL Stanley Cup Finals on Tuesday and the NBA Finals on Wednesday. Both telecasts were the best this decade for the first game of either series. Starting with the larger audience: Game 1 of the NBA Finals between the Knicks and Spurs averaged 16.93m viewers, the best for the series opener since 2018. Wednesday’s game grew by 90 percent from the last year’s game 1 (8.91m). On Tuesday, game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals delivered 4.78m viewers who watched the Golden Knights beat the Hurricanes, 5-4. The game was up by 54 percent from ABC’s last Stanley Cup opener in 2024 (3.11m). The ratings.
—Woof! Love Island USA has gotten off to a fast start with Peacock viewers. The streamer says the first three days of season eight have pulled in 824m viewing minutes, a record for any Peacock original series over that length of time. That figure is up by a robust 74 percent compared to the first three days of last year’s season. Peacock also says that 23 percent of Love Island viewing so far this week came from mobile devices, based on its internal data. That equates to about 190m minutes of watch time, with the other 634m or so minutes coming from TV screens. The ratings.
—Old boys club. Louis C.K., Jay Leno and Stephen A. Smith are among the big names who will participate in the celebration of Bill Maher when the veteran stand-up comedian and TV talk show host receives the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor at the Kennedy Center on June 28. Others set to participate in the ceremony, which will be filmed for Netflix, include Whitney Cummings, Woody Harrelson, Arianna Huffington and John Mellencamp. The story.
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►"Plenty of sugar but not enough flavor." THR's Angie Han reviews Drake Doremus' Next Life. Emilia Clarke, Edgar Ramírez and Jack Farthing star in this Sliding Doors-style drama from the writer-director of Like Crazy, following a 30something Londoner across two alternate realities. Written by Drake Doremus. The review.
—"Still a lightning rod almost half a century later." THR's chief film critic David Rooney reviews Jeffrey Schwarz's Mineshaft: The Cruising Murders. Queer culture doc specialist Schwarz looks at the killing that inspired William Friedkin’s 1980 film Cruising and the protests triggered by perceptions of internalized homophobia, exploitation and stigmatization. Featuring Dan Savage, Michael Musto, Randy Jurgensen, Don Scardino, Robert Geary, Pamela Verrill Walker, Andy Humm, Charles Kaiser, Dennis Dermody, Frank Henenlotter, James Polchin, Jim Hubbard, Matt Foreman, Richard Berkowitz and Richard Goldstein. The review.
—"Dry but persuasive." THR's Daniel Fienberg reviews Peter, George and Teddy Kunhardt's Mario. The trio of filmmakers assemble the late New York governor's children — including former governor and failed mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo and former CNN newsman Chris Cuomo — to remember their father. The review.
In other news...
—Andre Holland, Wendell Pierce lead trailer for Hulu’s boxing drama They Fight
—Taylor Swift drops “I Knew It, I Knew You” music video
—Ariana Grande launches Eternal Sunshine tour
—Sharon Horgan, Richard E. Grant, Claire Foy among stars at THR’s Studio at SXSW London
—Hermès in the Hills. The French luxury giant goes Hollywood
—Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jesse Eisenberg to receive Karlovy Vary honors
—Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce planning July wedding at MSG
What else we're reading...
—Amy Hawkins reports on the China's attempts to suppress independent cinema, and the brave young film-makers pushing back [Guardian]
—Nick Corasaniti interviews Bruce Springsteen, who discusses his place in American music [NYT]
—Fascinating story from Dasl Yoon and Timothy W. Martin, who report on the economic miracle of North Korea [WSJ]
—Thomas Beller looks at how watching the Knicks courtside has evolved over decades, and what it says about the city [Bloomberg]
—Wonderful Jack Hamilton piece on Steven Spielberg’s annus mirabilis in 1993, a year the legendary filmmaker could do no wrong [Slate]
Today...
...in 1984, America met the Ghostbusters, as the Bill Murray and Dan Aykroyd comedy hit theaters nationwide. The original review.
Today's birthdays...
Frank Grillo (61), Nancy Sinatra (86), Dan Futterman (59), Keenen Ivory Wayans (68), Dimple Kapadia (69), Julianna Margulies (60), Griffin Dunne (71), Sonia Braga (76), Mark Feuerstein (55), Jess Weixler (45), Anthony Boyle (32), Florence Faivre (43), Erica Schmidt (51), Josette Halpert (32), Josh Pence (44), Torrey DeVitto (42), Lexa Doig (53), Eion Bailey (50), Kathy Baker (76), Maria Menounos (48), David Sutcliffe (57), Charlotte Lawrence (26)
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Anthony Head, the British actor who guided Buffy the Vampire Slayer as the heroine’s Watcher, Rupert Giles and also starred in Ted Lasso, died Friday. He was 72. The obituary.
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