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Tonight, your lingering Taylor Sheridan questions answered, including… Wait, what just happened? Peacock? Really? He’s now doing Call of Duty? On top of everything else? And what happens to the old shows when their creator leaves town?

Discussed in this issue: Ben Affleck, Taylor Sheridan, Mike Cavanagh, David Ellison, Michelle Pfeiffer, Brian Roberts, Brandon Sklenar, Cindy Holland, Pete Berg, Pam Abdy, Amy Pascal, Samuel L. Jackson, David Glasser, Brooks Barnes, Luke Grimes, Emma Stone, Melissa McCarthy, Mike De Luca, Clive Owen, and… James Dean’s boots.

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Now more on the Taylor Sheridan earthquake…

In Sunday’s issue, I tried to explain all the angles of Taylor Sheridan’s shocking decision to leave Paramount for NBCUniversal after his film and TV deals expire—in March and when the ball drops on 2029, respectively. Yet all week people have bombarded me with questions, and while the torrent of follow-up media coverage has surfaced some odd details (more about David Zaslav and the James Dean boots, below), it hasn’t really illuminated how this will all work going forward. So let’s do that tonight. I’ve tried to break out the big questions, starting with…

The NBCUniversal TV overall deal begins at the stroke of midnight on January 1, 2029. Until then, Sheridan’s current Paramount contract is in full force. Could he just slow-walk his various projects so that little, if anything, gets done? Not really. Sheridan’s deal includes very clear and specific productivity requirements, meaning he’s got to deliver scripts and producing services on existing shows, as well as create new ones. This isn’t just for Paramount’s benefit; Sheridan and his team plan out his projects way in advance. He’s currently writing and producing season three of Lioness and finishing the first season of The Madison, a new Yellowstone-adjacent show with Michelle Pfeiffer—all while executive producing the Yellowstone follow-up Dutton Ranch, starring Cole Hauser and Kelly Reilly; Y: Marshals, the CBS procedural spinoff of Yellowstone with Luke Grimes; and another season of Tulsa King, with Sylvester Stallone; and its spinoff, NOLA King, with Samuel L. Jackson.

Then he’ll write a third season of Landman (Season 2 premieres November 16), more Madison and Lioness, and, depending on how the other new shows do, he’ll E.P. those too. Sheridan also owes Paramount two to three original pilots before his deal ends. I’m told one of those will be 1944, the third Yellowstone prequel series, and the others are still T.B.D. Multiple sources say Sheridan has no plans to slow down, even during his lame-duck period.

One big reason that Sheridan bolted was because he didn’t feel properly respected by David Ellison and his streaming TV boss, Cindy Holland, who has questioned his budgets as she plots her own slate for Paramount+. If Holland indeed feels the Sheridan shows have become too expensive, and she doesn’t need to appease a showrunner with one foot out the door, she could begin trimming orders or even canceling some shows from Sheridan or David Glasser’s 101 Studios, his studio/collaborator that also produces non-Sheridan shows for Paramount+.

But unless the relationship really breaks down, that seems highly unlikely for the simple reason that both Sheridan’s and 101’s series perform. But… there’s currently a behind-the-scenes issue over Unspeakable: The Murder of JonBenét Ramsey, a non-Sheridan limited series starring Melissa McCarthy and Clive Owen that 101 Studios is producing for Paramount+. According to sources, Paramount lawyers are super nervous about the already-shot show, which dramatizes the mysterious murder of the 6-year-old beauty queen back in 1996, especially since CBS was forced to write a big check in 2019 to settle a $750 million defamation lawsuit brought by Ramsey’s brother over the contents of a JonBenet docuseries. A full legal review is now pending, but there’s a strong chance Paramount+ will scrap the show and let Glasser sell it elsewhere. (Paramount and 101 declined to comment.)

Yes. I asked Antenna, the research firm, to run a little report for me, and the results are pretty striking: Taking out the original Yellowstone, which resides exclusively on Peacock for reasons that remain both tragic and hilarious, Sheridan shows drive huge viewership on Paramount+. I think we all knew that, but they also overperform as acquisition titles, which means that people are signing up specifically to watch his shows.

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Antenna analyzed four recent Sheridan seasons (Landman S1, Lioness S2, Tulsa King S2, and 1923 S2) and compared them to four other top Paramount+ series to determine how many sign-ups each was responsible for in its first 90 days on Par+. The top three acquisition titles among those analyzed were all Sheridan: Landman (2.9 million sign-ups), Lioness (2.2 million), and Tulsa King (1.9 million). Further, MobLand was the only non-Sheridan title that out-acquisitioned a Sheridan show during its first 90 days on the service—and that was produced by 101 Studios, which will also transition over to NBC Universal.

As for “engagement,” or viewership, on the platform, Sheridan shows bring in customers who watch more programming overall than non-Sheridan subscribers. Across multiple Sheridan titles, 14 percent to 36 percent of their premiere viewers remained active at 11 weeks post-premiere, compared to just 11 percent for the top non-Sheridan title, MobLand. And in weeks one through six following the premiere of a season, subscribers who signed up for a Sheridan show maintained 36 percent to 45 percent weekly engagement, versus 24 percent to 31 percent for the other analyzed titles.

The Sheridan-verse also tends to fold in on itself, meaning his viewers really love to watch other Sheridan content. Some 63 percent of customers who watched Season 1 of Landman watched other Sheridan shows. That drops to 46 percent for Season 2 of Tulsa King, 37 percent for Season 2 of Lioness, and 25 percent for Season 2 of 1923. But that’s still huge. In short, if you like Taylor Sheridan, you watch more programming overall and you are very likely going to sample other Sheridan shows, which, with one exception, currently all reside on the same platform. Pretty valuable!

Sheridan’s film deals are a bit more nuanced than has been reported. He’s currently under an exclusive movie pact with Paramount. But while Universal gets into business with him starting in March, Paramount will maintain its first-look for film projects that Sheridan writes through the end of 2028, when his TV deal ends. (That’s because Sheridan’s current film arrangement grew out of his TV contract.)

So if Sheridan writes an original movie script next summer, he would still need to show it to Paramount first—and if they pass, he can then take it to Universal. That’s potentially significant because Paramount could slow down Universal’s effort to take advantage of its pricey new asset by exercising that option. But remember, Paramount hasn’t seemed too interested in Sheridan as an original film writer, and it recently rejected a movie project that he had penned. After March, Sheridan could then take that to Universal.

Further complicating matters: For the past few months, Ellison has been trying to convince Sheridan to co-write and produce a Call of Duty movie with Pete Berg, who would also direct. That’s now happening, and even throughout the whole NBCUniversal drama, Taylor and David have been speaking about CoD. Sheridan doesn’t plan to be an on-set producer, I’m told, but a big-budget, I.P.-driven project like that will likely require more of his attention. He’s also got F.A.S.T., a separate film project based on an old script, which Warner Bros. is making at a pretty hefty budget, considering it stars the unproven (but Sheridan fave) Brandon Sklenar.

Much has been written about how the Sheridan-Paramount relationship broke down, and how Donna Langley, chair of NBCU Entertainment and Studios, quietly swooped in to win him over. David Zaslav, the Warner Discovery C.E.O., for some reason let it be known that his failed courtship included gifting Sheridan a pair of cowboy boots worn by James Dean in a Warners movie. That tidbit prompted more than a little head-shaking at the studio. Can Zaz just give away a pretty meaningful piece of studio memorabilia? Especially since the gift was not to someone who actually worked on the movie in question?

Hold on, it’s actually interesting. For a charity auction or a gift of studio memorabilia, especially the valuable stuff, I’m told there is generally what’s called a “stakeholder check.” If an actor makes a request, the check would go to that actor’s stakeholder—Mike De Luca and Pam Abdy for the film studio, Casey Bloys for HBO, etcetera. For instance, Ben Affleck wanted one of the Batsuits he wore as Batman or the Batcycle he used in The Flash. Mike and Pam approved the request, and Affleck eventually chose the Batcycle. If an executive stakeholder wants to proactively gift something to an actor or filmmaker, in many cases that would essentially be considered the stakeholder check. But there are times when a gift or request to auction is denied. Like if a prop or costume might still be used in some way later.

In this instance, Zaslav really wanted to give Sheridan something extra special from a Western to thank him for making F.A.S.T. at the studio despite pressure from Paramount—and to win him over for future projects. So the archives department provided a list of potential gifts that included the boots, which Zaz chose because—and I’m quoting his rep here—“his work is redefining and reinvigorating epic drama set in the West.”

Okay, sorry. Sheridan’s five-year NBCU deal pays him extremely well, but the $1 billion figure being floated is dependent on productivity and success on par with his Paramount output. He must write original pilots, as well as contribute meaningfully to the series, and those shows must deliver enough of an audience to get renewed. Sheridan is guaranteed a certain amount of slots on NBCU platforms, whatever they might be in 2029.

Yes and no. That’s sort of the peril of giving a big overall deal to a name showrunner: They’re a name for a reason, and they likely have other stuff going on. If you remember, this became a sore spot for Netflix when it paid nine figures for Ryan Murphy, who continued to work on his exploitative murder shows at FX/Disney while trying to create more exploitative murder shows at Netflix. Eventually, Netflix got frustrated enough to let Murphy return to Disney, where he is now making yet more exploitative murder shows while still working on the Netflix exploitative murder shows that he created while distracted by his original exploitative murder shows.

So yes, Sheridan can still serve as an executive producer on Landman, Dutton Ranch, and all the Paramount shows that will exist in 2029 and beyond, but he won’t be writing them. And I’m told he has no plans to do much more than what is contractually required on those shows after he leaves.

That’s the most interesting question, as I suggested on Sunday. Langley wouldn’t get the green light to commit this kind of money to fuel Peacock—a U.S.-only platform with just 41 million subscribers—if the plan wasn’t to grow it with dramatic investment or dealmaking. Multiple people have told me lately that something big is up at Comcast corporate, and co-C.E.O. Mike Cavanagh didn’t do much today to quell suspicion that the company will indeed go after Warner Bros. Discovery’s streaming and studio assets.

Many analysts have predicted that Donald Trump’s open vitriol toward the Roberts family takes “Concast” (Trump’s word) out of the M&A wars until 2029. Naaah, Cavanagh suggested. “I think more things are viable than maybe some of the public commentary that’s out there,” he said on the earnings call today. I know he has to say that, but I’m betting that some banker or Bain consultant is currently modeling how many White House ballroom donations or Rachel Maddow firings it would take to change the Trump tune on buying WBD… or spinning off NBCUniversal into a new company with HBO and Warner Bros. … or any number of floated scenarios. The most tantalizing and weirdly persistent rumor has Comcast teaming with Netflix to jointly buy WBD, then carve it up into HBO and the cable networks for Comcast (it would likely then spin the networks into Versant or sell them elsewhere), and the studio and its precious I.P. for Netflix.

Sure. Hopefully this all ends with a season of The White Lotus set at a dude ranch in West Texas.

See you Monday,
Matt

Maya Tribbitt contributed research for today’s issue.

Got a question, comment, complaint, or a preferred gift from the Warner Bros. archive? Email me at Matt@puck.news or call/text me at 310-804-3198.

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