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    "original_url": "https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2026\/09\/22\/business\/media\/david-ellison-hollywood-mega-mogul.html?emc=edit_nn_20260922&nl=the-morning&segment_id=226865",
    "parsed_content": "Paramount-Warner Bros. DealAgreement ReachedReaction to SettlementDavid EllisonCNN\u2019s FutureVideo: What Paramount Would OwnAdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTSupported bySKIP ADVERTISEMENTThe \u2018Kid\u2019 Takes Over: David Ellison Becomes a Hollywood ColossusWith Paramount and Warner Bros. under his control, Mr. Ellison will be \u201cthe Hollywood equivalent of Superman, Caesar and Midas combined.\u201d But challenges remain.Listen \u00b7 7:44 min Share full articleDavid Ellison, the 43-year-old chief executive of Paramount Skydance, will run an empire of unprecedented breadth in Hollywood.Credit...Caroline Brehman\/ReutersBy Brooks BarnesReporting from Los AngelesSept. 22, 2026, 5:03 a.m. ETSee more of our coverage in your search results.Encuentra m\u00e1s de nuestra cobertura en los resultados de b\u00fasqueda. Add The New York Times on GoogleAgrega The New York Times en Google The age of the Hollywood mogul was supposed to be over. Movies are dead, haven\u2019t you heard? Even the grandest studio \u2014 Warner Bros. \u2014 had started to resemble a relic of a powerful past.Then came a \u201ckid.\u201dDavid Ellison, the son of the Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, was 23 when he arrived in the movie capital in 2006. Hollywood insiders laughed behind his back. He was dumb money to be fleeced, another star-struck rich guy with a checkbook. A 2015 GQ profile ran with the headline \u201cThe Kid Pays for the Picture.\u201dOn Monday, after a remarkable, almost inconceivable run of dealmaking and brinkmanship, Mr. Ellison \u2014 all of 43 years old \u2014 stood on the verge of adding Warner Bros. Discovery to his Paramount Skydance, giving him control of two businesses that helped invent the movie and television industries. A settlement with 12 states cleared the antitrust lawsuit that was the remaining obstacle to the $111 billion takeover.Mr. Ellison was already an unusual figure in modern Hollywood \u2014 a controlling owner who was also chief executive and a hands-on movie and television producer. Adding Warner Bros. Discovery will expand his power to a scale without precedent, spanning a wider range of media than the empires of classic moguls like Jack Warner and Louis B. Mayer.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTEven Bob Iger, for all his regal command as Disney\u2019s chief executive over the decades, never combined all those roles.\u201cDavid\u2019s about to become the Hollywood equivalent of Superman, Caesar and Midas combined,\u201d Joseph M. Singer, a veteran film financier and former studio executive, said in an email. \u201cHe won\u2019t just be sitting at the table. He\u2019ll have extraordinary influence over who gets a seat.\u201dMr. Singer had publicly opposed the sale of Warner Bros. Discovery to Paramount Skydance, citing concerns about consolidation-related job losses and the roughly $79 billion in net debt that the conglomerate would carry at closing, among other worries.\u201cI believe David\u2019s intentions are good and his ambitions genuine,\u201d Mr. Singer said on Monday. \u201cBut I remain concerned that this concentration of power is not in the interests of our business. I hope I am proved wrong.\u201dOther critics were not so generous on Monday. A senior agent and two film producers privately likened Mr. Ellison to Michael Corleone in \u201cThe Godfather,\u201d a Paramount film. The character began as an outsider and became the boss, consolidating power with startling effectiveness.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTThe Ellison family\u2019s ties to President Trump \u2014 which included a dinner that David Ellison hosted in April \u201chonoring the Trump White House\u201d \u2014 have made many Democrats and a sizable contingent in Hollywood wary of his growing power. His empire will now span CNN and CBS News; HBO, MTV, BET, Comedy Central and TNT; the Paramount+ and HBO Max streaming services; and two of Hollywood\u2019s oldest movie studios.Put another way, Mr. Ellison will soon have Batman, Harry Potter, Captain Kirk, Wonder Woman, Ethan Hunt, Maverick and SpongeBob SquarePants reporting to him.\u201cWe vehemently oppose the agreement to allow David Ellison to take over Warner Bros. Discovery,\u201d a campaign called Block the Merger said in a statement. \u201cThis is a bad deal for the future of film, entertainment, independent journalism and a strong democracy in this country.\u201dThe campaign was organized by the Future Film Coalition, a nonprofit that gathered thousands of signatures from film and television workers opposed to the merger.Mr. Ellison settled the antitrust lawsuits with California and 11 other states after months of legal and political combat. The lawsuits argued that the merger would reduce competition in movies and cable TV.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTThe states relented after Mr. Ellison agreed to concessions, including a five-year commitment to release at least 30 movies annually, $1.5 billion in additional domestic production spending and the creation of an independent board to safeguard editorial independence at CNN and CBS News.In an email to Paramount employees on Monday, Mr. Ellison said he expected the Warner Bros. Discovery takeover to close in about two weeks. He will exercise control of Paramount and Warner Bros. through his family\u2019s 77.5 percent stake in the company\u2019s voting shares.\u201cThis is the first time since Walt Disney that you will have a family own and control a major Hollywood company with this level of hands-on management,\u201d said Gerry Cardinale, a Paramount board member. Mr. Cardinale is the founder of RedBird Capital, the second-largest investor in Mr. Ellison\u2019s deal for Warner Bros. Discovery.\u201cThere\u2019s a changing of the guard taking place,\u201d Mr. Cardinale added, referring not only to Mr. Ellison\u2019s ascension but also to an owner-operated model that Hollywood had largely abandoned.Amassing all that power may prove easier than wielding it.Along with the mountain of debt, Mr. Ellison\u2019s new company will need to contend with a cable-TV business that is shrinking as viewers continue to cut the cord. He must also integrate two enormous companies \u2014 he has promised $6 billion in savings \u2014 while navigating internal turmoil and political and editorial pressures at CBS News and CNN. Despite owning two major streaming services, Mr. Ellison will still be competing against Netflix and YouTube.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTHe also faces Hollywood\u2019s most basic problem: how to make movies and TV shows that enough people want to watch.After a banner run last year, Warner Bros. has stumbled badly at the box office in 2026. It ranks sixth among the seven largest studios in domestic market share this year, according to data from Rentrak, which tracks ticket sales. Paramount is seventh. Each has about 5 percent of the market, compared with 24 percent for Universal, the leader, and 21 percent for Disney.On Monday, however, Hollywood focused less on Mr. Ellison\u2019s challenges than it did on his remarkable rise.It was only 13 months ago that he completed an $8 billion deal to buy Paramount, home to CBS, MTV, Nickelodeon and its namesake movie studio. Four months later, Mr. Ellison launched a hostile bid for Warner Bros. Discovery, which had already agreed to sell itself to Netflix. By February, he had outmaneuvered Netflix and had a deal in place.Twelve Democratic state attorneys general then sued to block the Warner takeover. Thousands of film and television workers publicly opposed the combination. The Writers Guild of America mounted its own legal challenge.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTNone of it stopped him.A man who spent years struggling to be taken seriously had become impossible to underestimate.In the email to employees, Mr. Ellison positioned the closing not as a culmination but as a beginning. \u201cClosing is really just the starting line,\u201d he said, adding: \u201cI\u2019m confident we\u2019re going to build something special together in the years ahead.\u201cLet\u2019s go!\u201dAdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENT",
    "published_at": "2026-09-22T09:03:36+00:00",
    "author_name": "Brooks Barnes",
    "site_name": "The New York Times",
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    "ai_headline": "The \u2018Kid\u2019 Takes Over: David Ellison Becomes a Hollywood Colossus",
    "ai_simplified_title": "David Ellison Becomes Hollywood Colossus After Paramount-Warner Bros. Deal",
    "ai_excerpt": "David Ellison, 43, is set to control an unprecedented Hollywood empire after a $111 billion takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery by Paramount Skydance. This deal, following a settlement of antitrust lawsuits, makes him a dominant figure in media, spanning film studios, streaming services, and news outlets.",
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