Greetings from Seattle, where I’m visiting family, and welcome back to In the Room. Some late-breaking news tonight: The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump is threatening another lawsuit against Paramount and CBS News amid an impasse over the terms of a settlement for his existing lawsuit. Paramount Global has offered $15 million to settle, per the Journal, while Trump’s team wants more than $25 million. Meanwhile, I’ve got more on Shari Redstone’s latest 60 Minutes anxieties down below. In tonight’s main story, news and notes on the gentlemanly David Leavy defenestration at CNN, a bookend to a particularly dispiriting few years that illustrates some of the broader problems at Warner Bros. Discovery. Officially, Leavy is returning to the WBD mothership, but the truth, as always, is a little more nuanced. 🍸 Plus, some Grill Room highlights from over the long holiday weekend: First, Julia Alexander and I assessed the new Sam Altman–Jony Ive OpenAI bromance, as well as Jimmy Pitaro’s monumental ESPN pivot. Then, Jon Kelly and I unravelled the plot twists in Rob Manfred’s ongoing MLB media rights negotiations, and the latest fallout from Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson’s much-discussed Biden book. Follow The Grill Room on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you prefer to listen. Also mentioned in this issue: Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Zucker, Gerry Cardinale, JB Perrette, Sheikh Mansour, Will Lewis, Gunnar Wiedenfels, Matthew Continetti, Kathy Baird, and many more… Let’s get started…

Shari’s never-ending ‘60’ problems: While lawyers for Paramount struggle to reach a settlement with Trump’s team over his 60 Minutes lawsuit (see above), Shari Redstone still hasn’t managed to put her anxieties about the show to bed. As you know, Shari had become so concerned about 60 Minutes further complicating regulatory approval for her Skydance deal that she’d sought to delay critical stories about Trump until after the merger. And even though the show aired its final episode of the season earlier this month, I’m told producers are still considering inserting one more potentially sensitive new story into a rerun of the show this coming Sunday. The package, about recent layoffs of thousands of probationary officers at the I.R.S., was initially intended to run during the season’s final episode on May 18. Two days prior to air, the I.R.S. reframed the layoffs as a “pause” and announced that some employees would be rehired. By that time, the story’s correspondent, Anderson Cooper, was traveling to Africa and unavailable to record a new intro addressing the update, so producers chose to replace the I.R.S. piece with a story about Cajun music—presumably taking the less controversial exit ramp. (At the time, 60 noted that the broadcast had been updated due to “late-breaking developments,” and that it would continue to report the story.) Anyway, producers at 60 Minutes are continuing to work on the package, with tentative plans to swap it back into a future rerun. Sources say the story has gone through at least five internal screenings, three of which have been overseen by new CBS News president Tom Cibrowski. Though, obviously, as one insider put it, “Shari wants no more Trump stories. No surprise.”
Zuck gets FT’d: I’m told the Financial Times is preparing a lengthy deep dive into Mark Zuckerberg that is expected to drop next month. Meta’s front office has been on edge for weeks, and for a very specific reason: FT news editor Tom Braithwaite is married to Sarah Wynn-Williams, the former Facebook director of public policy who recently published Careless People, a scathing tell-all of her time at the company. Meta executives were so pissed that they inadvisably sought to block the author’s ability to promote the project, which inevitably gave it a sales boost. To its credit, the FT has noted Wynn-Williams’ relationship to “an FT editor” in previous articles about the book, but this has hardly soothed the nerves in Menlo Park.
Gerry takes The Telegraph: Gerry Cardinale and Sheikh Mansour have finally secured ownership of The Telegraph, bringing an end to a years-long struggle for the U.K.’s premier Tory broadsheet. As you’ll recall, the two parties had used their RedBird IMI joint venture, run by Jeff Zucker, to acquire the asset in 2023—only to be rebuffed by U.K. lawmakers, who objected to Emirati ownership and thus introduced new legislation to limit foreign control of newspapers to 15 percent. Whereas RedBird IMI’s takeover would have given Mansour 75 percent majority control, the new deal is structured to give RedBird 85 percent ownership and IMI 15 percent, which should be enough to secure regulatory approval.Meanwhile, Zucker’s own shingle is no longer part of the deal, which should dispel some of the theories about him expanding the business overseas to gain reentry in the U.S. news market. Cardinale and Mansour will almost certainly try to expand The Telegraph to the States, and are presumably going to look for domestic media brands to acquire in order to incite synergies. But the fantasies about achieving Daily Mail–like scale are probably overwrought, as it will remain a U.K.-centric business.
Will’s world: Will Lewis has implemented another round of buyouts at The Washington Post amid an overhaul of its digital video business and a streamlining of its editorial process. “Like the rest of our industry, we are adapting to changing habits and new technologies that are transforming news experiences,” executive editor Matt Murray wrote in a memo. Post video teams will now focus on “developing repeatable franchises and more personality-driven formats” for YouTube and other social networks, he said, belatedly mimicking the broader trend in the market. Buyouts are being offered to staff in the video, copy desk, and sports copy desk departments, as well as all newsroom employees who have been with the organization for more than 10 years. Elsewhere, deputy Opinions editor Mary Duenwald said Post Opinions would soon “carry out in earnest” the long-awaited pivot to a “personal liberties and free markets” posture, as articulated earlier this year by Jeff Bezos. (Yes, it’s taking a while.) As I reported in April, the Post has talked to American Enterprise Institute director and conservative columnist Matthew Continetti about the position, though Duenwald’s memo suggested they had yet to secure a new editor, and may not before the buyout period ends in July. “Ideally, our new editor will be known before the time is up,” she wrote.And finally, Lewis has decided not to replace his former comms chief Kathy Baird—a rare move for any media company, and especially one that has endured such a long time in the barrel. Comms director Liza Pluto and her V.P. Olivia Petersen will continue to handle business and editorial affairs at a non-executive level. Good luck to them—truly!
And finally… When you’re done here, I’d encourage you to read Lucas Shaw’s latest article on YouTube’s dominance in television. “As much as Hollywood has worried about labor strife, artificial intelligence and the demise of moviegoing,” Lucas writes, “the rise of YouTube is a much more immediate and real threat.”

And now, the main event…

When the Leavy Breaks

Once a member of Zaz’s WBD brain trust, David Leavy was dispatched to right the mid-Licht ship at CNN, staying on as C.O.O. for nearly two years. Now, he’s taking on an unspecified role that almost certainly doesn’t exist.

Dylan Byers

On Wednesday, CNN chief executive Mark Thompson announced that David Leavy, his chief operating officer, would be leaving the network and returning to an unspecified role at the parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery. In the grand scheme of CNN’s trajectory—the impending spinoff, the inevitable shrinkage, etcetera—the news was only a mildly notable bookend to a remarkably dispiriting few years. For insiders, however, it also highlighted some of the broader curiosities about WBD’s business. To get the awkward part out of the way, Leavy’s future role is unspecified because it does not yet exist, and may never exist. Instead, the opaque language is almost certainly a way of providing a soft landing for a loyal and very affable corporate operator who has served David Zaslav for two and a half decades—once as a trusted member of his inner circle, and, since joining CNN, in a liminal space just beyond the reach of the big kids’ table—and will soon have ample time to enjoy the very lucrative fruits of his labor. In truth, Leavy’s offboarding probably began two years ago. In June 2023, on the very same day that The Atlantic’s Tim Alberta put the final skewer into then-CNN chief Chris Licht—you may recall the infamous gym scene—Zaz placed Leavy in charge of all of CNN’s business operations, an obvious vote of no-confidence in Licht that presaged his defenestration in Central Park just five days later. The move accomplished multiple objectives: Leavy ostensibly managed the P&L, operational logistics, and marketing and P.R., while also serving as Zaz’s eyes and ears on the ground. After Licht’s termination, Leavy got to work under the hood determining who else needed to go—which, unsurprisingly, included all of Licht’s handpicked lieutenants, as well as the comms officials who took some of the heat for the P.R. disaster. At the same time, Leavy’s move hinted at Zaz’s limited confidence in his old chum. As chief corporate affairs officer during the first year after the merger, Leavy seemed to enjoy a privileged position in Zaz’s brain trust alongside a trusted team of Discovery veterans that included Gunnar, JB, Bruce, etcetera. His reassignment to CNN was effectively a demotion dressed up as yet another opportunity for a loyal deputy to demonstrate his ability to “fix the culture” of a beleaguered asset. (To his credit, Leavy’s affability did provide some initial comfort to traumatized CNN veterans at the time). But when Zaz announced Leavy’s place in a post-Licht, pre-Thompson interim leadership quadrumvirate, it only seemed to highlight how much he’d drawn the short end of the stick at WBD. Or, rather, that this show was coming to a close. When Thompson became C.E.O., in October 2023, it looked like Leavy’s days might be numbered. Instead, he stayed on for 18 months overseeing myriad aspects of the business, from promotion and communications (where he had plenty of experience) to revenue and operations (where, frankly, he didn’t), and trying to assuage the staff’s anxiety over ratings declines—CNN now averages less than half a million viewers in primetime—and the absence of tangible progress on the digital side. In announcing Leavy’s departure on Wednesday, Mark was forced to introduce a slew of new reporting lines that made evident just how many aspects of the business Leavy oversaw: revenue, marketing, partnerships, communications, business operations, etcetera, etcetera. Does Leavy have a future at WBD? Perhaps, once CNN and the other cable channels are spun out, Zaz will see a need for his managerial experience over at the new spinco, or may simply choose to once again reward his loyalty. One evergreen criticism of Zaz is that, no matter the company’s performance, he always manages to keep himself and his lieutenants well compensated. We’ll see if Leavy is still entitled to that privilege.

Puck sports correspondent John Ourand and a rotating cast of industry insiders take you inside the executive suites and owners boxes where the decisions that shape the entire sports business are made. You’ll hear interviews with players, network execs, and everyone in between. The Varsity is an extension of John’s private email for Puck by the same name. New episodes publish every Wednesday and Sunday.

An essential, insider-friendly Hollywood tip sheet from Matthew Belloni, who spent 14 years in the trenches at The Hollywood Reporter and five before that practicing entertainment law. What I’m Hearing also features veteran Hollywood journalist Kim Masters, as well as a special companion email from Eriq Gardner, focused on entertainment law, and weekly box office analysis from Scott Mendelson.

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