Mea culpa, I took today off rather than suffer more of Universal’s humiliating slings and arrows inevitably directed at me. Because, thanks to matinee and pre-sale tickets, the studio’s Bridesmaids passed Knocked Up around noon as Judd Apatow’s biggest grossing film, not adjusted for inflation or higher ticket…

UPDATE, 7:12 PM: Reps for MoviePass confirm they have thrown in the towel and canceled their test run in San Francisco this weekend. They say this is on a “temporary hiatus,” but I doubt we’ll see this service up and running again particularly since it’s clear two major theater chains don’t want it. That Moviepass…

A group of musicians protesting the Recording Academy’s move to drop 31 categories from the Grammy Awards is calling for a boycott of CBS, which airs the annual awards event, as well as the sponsors who advertise during the show, the Associated Press reported. The academy in April trimmed the number of categories from…

EXCLUSIVE: Humanitas’ New Voices initiative, a program designed to help up-and-coming television writers break into the business, has had plenty of success since launching in November 2010, with five projects ordered to script at various studios. Now the organization has hired TV executive and producer Lowell Mate for…

Wall Street has high expectations for AMC Networks as it prepares to begin its new life Friday as an independent, publicly traded company. Most, and possibly all, of the analysts following the owner of AMC, IFC, WeTV and Sundance have a “buy” rating on the stock, which Cablevision Systems is spinning off and will…

Scripps Networks seemed to dash investor hopes that it might be sold when the owner of HGTV and the Food Network announced today a plan to buy back $1 billion of its stock — including $300 million from its controlling shareholder, The Edward W. Scripps Trust. Speculation about a sale grew on June 17 when the…

EXCLUSIVE: Cross Creek Pictures has stepped up to finance A Walk Among the Tombstones, an adaptation of the Lawrence Block novel that seemed to have been put to rest more than a decade ago. DJ Caruso is in discussions to direct a script by Scott Frank. It is one of two pictures Caruso is considering for his next film…

EXCLUSIVE: Over his career, Christopher Nolan has only gotten involved in producing a picture he didn’t direct when he godfathered Man of Steel, the Warner Bros Superman reboot that’s going into production with Zack Snyder directing. Now, he’s quietly making another exception. I’m told that Nolan’s company, Syncopy…

Kansas City, Mo. (June 30, 2011) – AMC Theatres® (AMC), a leading theatrical exhibition and entertainment company, today announced it will not participate in the beta test of MoviePass, an initiative launching this weekend in the San Francisco area. “Plans for this program were developed without AMC’s knowledge or…

The mind-numbing network of interlocking corporate relationships at Live Nation — the No. 1 concert promoter and owner of Ticketmaster — just became much more complicated with the announcement that Jim Dolan is joining its board of directors. He’s a power in live entertainment in his role as executive chairman of…

EXCLUSIVE: Karen Croner has been set to script Hello Ghost, the film inspired by the Korean comedy about a man whose failed suicide attempt allows him to see ghosts who haunt him until he grants each of them one wish. Chris Columbus will direct a film that will be financed by CJ Entertainment, which has a first-look…

Fox News is taking a platoon approach this summer to fill Glenn Beck’s former time slot. It has announced a new show called The Five that will feature commentators including Juan Williams, Dana Perino, Judge Andrew Napolitano, Geraldo Rivera, Andrea Tantaros, Eric Bolling, Monica Crowley, and Bob Beckel. Beck’s last…