On Monday, Deadline broke the news that Lionsgate brought back a Covid mask mandate on two floors of its five-story flagship office in Santa Monica after several employees had tested positive. The story was widely picked up and made national news. That turned Lionsgate into a target for criticism over the mandate reinstatement amid a nationwide uptick in Covid cases.
Upon closer examination, it appears that Lionsgate was largely following orders from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, which in turn was likely implementing regulations set during the pandemic by California’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health, known as Cal/OSHA, which remain in effect.
Warner Bros Discovery Ivy Station Office, which also was listed on Public Health’s roster of recent Covid outbreaks, instituted a mask mandate, Deadline has been told. The measure was put in place first for the floor where the infections occurred and subsequently for the entire building out of an abundance of caution. After contact tracing and other measures were completed, the mandate was said to have been lifted days later.
These actions may come as a surprise to many since California’s Covid-19 State of Emergency was lifted February 28 and the federal Public Health Emergency on May 11. Yet companies continue to be required to disclose outbreaks, with some modifications to the reporting requirements. >>>List Of 11 Measures |
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Moving Day - Legendary Entertainment and Warner Bros’ anticipated sequel Dune: Part Two from Denis Villeneuve is moving off its November 3 theatrical release to March 15, 2024, due to the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike. The sequel based on the Frank Herbert novel also will play Imax on its new date. The shift had been widely expected. Don’t be surprised if Dune: Part Two debuts either at the Berlin Film Festival in February or SXSW in March. >>> Other Warners Films Staying Put
A Multi-Layered Life Story - Bayard Rustin, an influential organizer of the Civil Rights Movement and the architect of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, is the subject of George C. Wolfe's new film, starring Colman Domingo (Euphoria, Candyman, Fear the Walking Dead ). “You have to have an extraordinary degree of irreverence and approach it like, ‘This is a human being.’ Because if you’re doing icon crap, it is very easy for you to fall into boring or reverential, and we have statues for that,” Wolfe told Deadline in an interview. Rustin, whose director is known for his storied theater career as well as for directing films like Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, is the first feature from Michelle and Barack Obama's production company, Higher Ground. >>> Baz Bamigboye's Column
The Power Of Pink - Barbie kicked The Super Mario Bros Movie out of the year's top domestic spot on Wednesday. The Warner Bros. theatrical release made $2.55M sending its total running cume Stateside to $575.4M. Barbie isn’t the highest grossing film of 2023 yet around the world, with $1.3 billion compared with Super Mario‘s $1.35 billion. >>>First Imax Run In September
Desperate Times, Groundbreaking Movies - Breakthrough movies of years past invaded the zeitgeist because they were relentlessly defiant (Midnight Cowboy) or simply inevitable (Harry Potter). Ironically, some of Hollywood’s most culturally-ambitious movies were created at moments when films were being largely ignored by the filmgoing public – Doctor Zhivago (1965) or Lawrence of Arabia (1962). Where do great films come from? A superficial glimpse of film history would lead us to believe that they emerge not from times of success, but from moments of distress. >>>Peter Bart's Column |
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Exclusive
Isabella Gomez (One Day at a Time, The Goldbergs) is set to star in the indie horror film The Mannequin, from writer-director John Berardo (Initiation). The project falls under the SAG-AFTRA Ultra Low Budget Agreement and was just added to the list of projects receiving an interim agreement from the guild. Production will begin in Los Angeles next week.
Maya Jama, who hosts the British version of Love Island, is heading to Fiji. The presenter will host Love Island Games, the Peacock spinoff of the dating format. It brings her together with comedian Iain Stirling, who narrates the UK and U.S. versions of the show as well as this new extension. |
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More News
📺 CNN and MSNBC skipped Donald Trump’s brief remarks on the Atlanta airport tarmac Thursday following his arrest, citing his past falsehoods about the 2020 presidential election. Fox News did carry the statement, his first since he was arrested, booked and released at Fulton County Jail.
⚔️ New Line’s animated movie The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim is moving from its April 12, 2024 release date to December 13 of next year. The move stems from a chain reaction of Warner Bros re-dating Thursday, spurred by Legendary Entertainment’s Dune: Part Two moving from November 3 this year to March 15, 2024, which pushed that financier and producer’s other title, Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire, from that date to April 12, 2024.
🏈 Broderick Johnson and Andrew Kosove, the co-founders of The Blind Side financier Alcon Entertainment, who also served as producers for the supposedly true-life family drama, have addressed controversy stemming from a recent lawsuit filed by pic’s subject Michael Oher, claiming there have been “many mischaracterizations and uninformed opinions” put out about the situation, and that the film they made is “as true today as it was 14 years ago.”
✂️ Fifth Season, the company formerly known as Endeavor Content, is cutting around 12% of its workforce as a result of the impact of the dual Hollywood strikes. The company, which is behind series such as Severance and Normal People, is axing 30 positions, across both executive and administrative roles. |
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Trending  After a four-week streak, Suits didn’t manage to break its own record for viewing minutes in a single measurement week from July 24 to July 30. But that doesn’t mean the mania around the legal dramedy has slowed down. The series still drew a massive 3.6B viewing minutes across Netflix and Peacock and, once again, reigned over Nielsen’s streaming charts.
🔻 Los Angeles County officials have reported a rise in measures of Covid transmission for the fifth consecutive week. The average of 512 daily cases this week is a nearly 35% increase over last week week. Possibly more important, test positivity has risen to 14%. That’s above the 13.8% test positivity peak last winter and very close to the peak of 15.64% the county saw last summer. |
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OBITUARIES
🕯 Peter Gonzales Falcon, the Texan who starred as a young Federico Fellini in the director’s semi-autobiographical Roma, has died. He was 75. 🕯 Hersha Parady, who won the hearts of Little House on the Prairie viewers with her 1977-1980 portrayal of Alice Garvey, died following surgery last month for the brain cancer meningioma. She was 78. 🕯WWE performer Bray Wyatt (real name Windham Rotunda) died Thursday at 36. A cause of death was not immediately made available. 🕯Police are investigating the death of 22-year-old social media influencer Beauty Couch, whose body was found near a vehicle engulfed in flames in Austell, Georgia. 🕯 Hollywood & Media Deaths In 2023: Photo Gallery & Obituaries |
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On the Radar
Sun - The Streamy Awards; National Cinema Day
Mon - Trump's first Jan. 6 hearing; U.S. Open Tennis Championships begin in NYC
Wed - Venice Film Festival opens |
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Inmate No. P01135909 - Donald Trump turned himself in to authorities in Fulton County, GA on Thursday, a process that diverged from his previous indictment because it included his mugshot. The booking photo, released by the Fulton County Sheriff, was shown for hours on cable news networks as they tracked the spectacle of a former president being arrested. According to jail records, Trump was arrested and booked as inmate No. P01135909. |
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