The Chinese filmmaker’s Ne Zha 2 has grossed over $1.6 billion and counting, almost all of it from Chinese theaters alone. It’s the first film to gross more than $1 billion in a single territory. (Scott Mendelson has more below…) Runners-up: Edward Berger and Brady Corbet, whose Conclave (picture) and The Brutalist (director), respectively, won the top two BAFTAs, offering a sliver of Oscars hope against Anora, which has now won the PGA, DGA, and WGA awards, with the SAGs next weekend.

Tom Cruise may or may not be dating Ana de Armas, but he’s for sure in bed with someone else new: Ron Burkle. The supermarket billionaire and owner of Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch quietly bought film finance outfit New Republic Pictures late last year from Russian oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev, with plans to ramp up an entity that has been relatively quiet lately. Burkle’s rep confirmed the deal but declined to comment further. Run by Brian Oliver, New Republic has a slate financing deal at Paramount, backing everything from Top Gun: Maverick to Mission: Impossible—Dead Reckoning. They’re also in the next super-pricey Mission and Paramount’s planned sequel to 2021’s Chris Pratt-fistfights-an-alien pic, The Tomorrow War, at Amazon. Burkle, of course, is a familiar face in Hollywood. He was a Weinstein Co. investor, hit the jackpot bankrolling Yellowstone producer 101 Studios, and quietly funds manager Rick Yorn’s LBI Entertainment. With New Republic, Burkle may have bought his way into a deposition in the nearly $20 million lawsuit brought by Bradley Fischer, its former president, who claims he was screwed out of an E.P. credit on the most recent Mission. As Eriq Gardner reported last week, that case is headed for an April trial… around the time that Michael, the troubled Jackson biopic I wrote about last month, will be back at Burkle’s Neverland doing extensive reshoots.

“Taylor, I do not negotiate with terrorists.” —Lorne Michaels, quoted in New York, when Taylor Swift called in 2015 to ask that SNL kill a planned sketch about her cult-like “squad.” Runner-up: “Our audience is mostly rich now.” —Michaels, joking to Maureen Dowd when she asked if he can be a multimillionaire and still run a show making fun of rich and powerful people. Second runner-up: “Imagine calling anyone strident when you have built a career out of elevating the loudest guy in the room.” —Samantha Bee, reacting to Michaels saying in a new book that SNL can’t be like Bee because, the author notes, she’s “one-sided and strident.” Third runner-up: “Honestly, I have my own life. I cannot devote any more time to Lorne …” —Graydon Carter, replying all to a star-studded and amusing email chain about a book party for Susan Morrison’s Lorne.

This one’s too funny: David Zaslav is scrambling to head off another potential media misstep. The Warner Bros. Discovery C.E.O.—who, you’ll recall, did himself no favors with lavish Vanity Fair and Variety spreads amid relentless layoffs and cost-cutting, plus the tone-deaf cream-colored Cannes celebration during the writers strike, plus that disastrous commencement speech in the mirrored supervillain shades—is now participating in a New York magazine profile by Michael Wolff, the sharp-penciled Trump and Murdoch biographer. It doesn’t seem to be going well because Zaz and his P.R. guy, Robert Gibbs, have been calling very high-level friends, imploring them to get in touch with Wolff and defend Zaz. Gibbs characterized the outreach to me as providing Wolff a routine source list, “just as I, and every other communications professional, have done thousands and thousands of times over the past 30 years of doing this.” But Zaslav and Gibbs have been making calls themselves lately, and one person told me he was surprised that Zaz asked him to explain to Wolff how WBD staffers actually like him. Like, as a person.

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ANORA IS THE MOST AWARDED FILM OF THE YEAR. Winner of the Critics Choice Best Picture, DGA Best Director, and PGA Best Picture awards, ANORA has been hailed as “a marvel of filmmaking and acting” (NYT) that “reaffirms that movies are still capable of generating miracles” (Rolling Stone). A culmination of 30 years of filmmaking from writer/director/editor Sean Baker, ANORA is nominated for six Academy Awards^® including Best Picture and Best Director.  This awards season, the choice is simple: Follow your heart.

Ari Emanuel went on another podcast, where he called Elon Musk a “close friend” and said he told Jeffrey Katzenberg “we are telling lies [about Joe Biden’s age] and calling everyone [else] liars.” [Freakonomics] Settling with Trump would seem to fit squarely in the category of corporate decisions covered by D&O insurance, but Paramount’s brain trust (or, more likely, the wussy lawyers advising it) apparently feels there’s risk of liability. [WSJ] Captain America 4’s disastrous test screenings prompted 22 days of reshoots and the last-minute addition of a new villain. Because that always works. [Vulture] Related: Kevin Feige should send Asad Ayaz and the Disney marketing team a big box of pastries after Marvel’s objectively terrible Brave New World hits $100 million this long weekend. Now let’s see about that hold. [Outside Scoop] Peter Hamby checks in on L.A.’s post-fires political tar pit that has now ensnared Ted Sarandos and Mike Hopkins. [Puck] Hawk Tuah Girl’s bafflingly successful podcast is engulfed in a crypto memecoin scandal as stupid as she seems to be. [Bloomberg]

With the exception of Peacock, the major streaming services are all profitable now, their owners will delight in telling you. But all is far from well in the streaming business, as a new MoffettNathanson report breaks down. Some highlights:

My ‘SNL50’ report and Thursday’s somewhat fiery chat with Netflix content chief Bela Bajaria generated lots of feedback… “This is how you interview a major entertainment executive. You were respectful, but also applied an appropriate amount of pressure. I wish we lived in a world in which just one media exec could acknowledge the reality of the current ecosystem while still serving their corporate-mandated P.R. spin. It would be far more endearing than this head-in-sand denialism.” —An analyst “I like [Bajaria] more now. I admire when executives take hard questions and are willing to give it right back. You two should go on the road together.” —An agent “Amazing to see Bajaria claim Oppenheimer would have been just as successful on Netflix when her evidence is Red Notice, a giant burning pile of money that no one cares about or remembers. How stupid do they think we are?” —A journalist “Does SNL50 kind of feel like it has this undertone as a farewell to democracy?” —An executive Now, here’s Scott’s interview with the head of Imax’s China operation…

No film has ever earned $1 billion at the U.S. box office. Avatar didn’t do it, nor did Star Wars: The Force Awakens or Avengers: Endgame. But the North American market is nowhere near as large as China, where Ne Zha 2, a follow-up to the 2019 animated blockbuster, has now grossed $1.636 billion and counting since its release on January 29—crushing the previous global record for a single marketplace. Any day now, Ne Zha 2 will also become the first non-English-language film to crack the top 10 of all-time worldwide theatrical grossers. It’s also not alone. During the past three weeks, which included the Lunar New Year, Chinese audiences turned out for Detective Chinatown 1900 ($440 million), Creation of the Gods II ($160 million), and Boonie Bears: Future Reborn (just over $100 million). Combined, these four blockbusters have grossed more than $2 billion in less than a month. This massive haul can be attributed, in part, to Imax screens, which are available in nearly 800 Chinese theaters—nearly half of Imax’s global footprint. The Lunar New Year tentpoles earned $121 million from Imax alone, nearly double the $66 million record set during the same window in 2023. To find out why, I called up Daniel Manwaring, C.E.O. of Imax China, to break it all down. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Scott Mendelson: What explains the success of Ne Zha 2? Is it essentially a Shrek 2 phenomenon—namely, a well-liked sequel to a beloved original—or is there more to it? Daniel Manwaring: Ne Zha comes from a much larger universe called Investiture of the Gods. It’s a small piece of a story that runs thousands of years, and which children learn growing up. So you’ve got I.P. that has been instilled in people for so long. Then you combine it with the fact that it’s a good movie. It’s got laughter, amazing action sequences, and the best animation quality China has ever done. It hits every demographic. Moreover, we’ve seen a lot of Chinese films that are partially about teaching the audience something, often with a very on-the-nose message. Ne Zha 2 doesn’t have any of that. Most Hollywood films released in China this decade have earned less than expected. One exception has been films from 20th Century Studios. For example, Alien: Romulus topped $100 million in China last summer. And Free Guy nabbed $95 million in 2021. Alien: Romulus would have likely never gotten into China until somewhat recently. That was an edgy film for this market. One reason it did so well is that a mother took her child to the film, the kid had a panic attack, and it was posted on social media. It inspired people to want to go see the film. I think those genres, which includes the Fox I.P., are a little edgier and a little more violent. We’re seeing a little opening on the threshold of censorship.

A MESSAGE FROM OUR SPONSOR

ANORA IS THE MOST AWARDED FILM OF THE YEAR. Winner of the Critics Choice Best Picture, DGA Best Director, and PGA Best Picture awards, ANORA has been hailed as “a marvel of filmmaking and acting” (NYT) that “reaffirms that movies are still capable of generating miracles” (Rolling Stone). A culmination of 30 years of filmmaking from writer/director/editor Sean Baker, ANORA is nominated for six Academy Awards^® including Best Picture and Best Director.  This awards season, the choice is simple: Follow your heart.

So we might see a push toward R-rated genre films that aren’t just patriotic or nationalist war epics? One-hundred percent. Deadpool & Wolverine and Alien: Romulus had blood everywhere, heads exploding, and yet they got in with few edits. This current administration of the Film Bureau is focused on box office performance. The attitude in China is: We’re open for business. I haven’t even heard the word “quota” in like, two years. I don’t even know if anyone’s keeping count of the quota anymore. [Ed. note: The Chinese government caps the number of foreign films that can be released each year; it started at 10 but has since been raised to 34.]

Covid arguably hit the Chinese movie business harder than Hollywood. In some ways, it’s still recovering. China was essentially late to the post-Covid world. They basically delayed everything for a year. So in 2023, you had a pipeline of about three years of films that were on a shelf. The Film Bureau came in, they turned on the faucet, and everything flooded out in 2023. However, in 2024, you had many if not most of the films launching that year that were produced amid this post-Covid hangover. People didn’t know what the budget should be, or if audiences were going to go back to the movies. You had this transitional kind of year. There just really weren’t any big movies. But now Ne Zha 2 just passed $104 million in Chinese Imax auditoriums alone, past the previous milestone, Avengers: Endgame, which earned around $83 million in 2019. We’ve heard bullish rumblings on the live-action How to Train Your Dragon remake—the previous two did about $60 million each in China. I’m curious if the franchises whose previous installments took downturns in China, like Mission: Impossible and Jurassic World, or even the MCU flicks, can get back to 2010s-era earnings this summer. It comes down to, “How relatable is the film?” Chinese audiences got burnt out on the same formula over and over. The timing of Oppenheimer [which earned $61 million in the market] affected the Imax release of Mission: Impossible—Dead Reckoning globally. What are the trouble signs you see for China? If you had asked me that question last year, I would have had a laundry list of things to say. However, NRG did a global survey, and 35 percent of the United States is willing to go see a movie in a theater. That matched up with the U.K. and France and most of Europe. China was 78 percent. I was telling my board, “I know things feel dim, but just trust this number.” There are still some risks: Does the film supply remain strong? Do release dates get pushed? Do we see people say, “Oh, I don't want to release this summer. I want to wait until the next Chinese New Year”? However, almost 300 million people are going to movie theaters here. As for us, specifically, as of this past Sunday, around 11.28 million admissions were recorded for Ne Zha 2 in Imax in China. That’s just a crazy number. What should Hollywood studios take away from the recent surge in moviegoing in China? It’s a great opportunity. Moviegoing in China tends to yield more moviegoing; it’s a consumer behavior that builds on itself. The Film Bureau designed this Chinese New Year slate to give the Chinese box office a jolt of adrenaline, and they’ve clearly done an incredible job. So, the hope is that will help buoy both the strong Chinese local-language slate and the Hollywood slate ahead in 2025. I’d encourage U.S. studios to lean into this opportunity with marketing campaigns that carefully consider local preferences and cultural nuances, and feel vital and resonant. Chinese audiences aren’t all that different from those in the U.S.—they want fresh, innovative storytelling that they haven’t seen or experienced before.

Disney’s Thunderbolts may have won the Super Bowl ad derby, given its spike in “unaided awareness” this week, according to The Quorum. Other winners include Jurassic World: Rebirth, which jumped from 2 percent unaided last week to 5 percent, and Lilo & Stitch and Mission: Impossible—The Final Reckoning, both of which rose to 4 percent…

Have a great week, Matt Got a question, comment, complaint, or a cringey reply-all thread? Email me at Matt@puck.news or call/text me at 310-804-3198.

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