Defamer

Sumner Redstone Apparently Finds Right Price to Forgive 'Good Friend' Tom Cruise

Viacom PR Admits 'Public Crapping' May Not Bode Well For New Pay Network

The marketplace reaction to the fourth feevee was predictable: Who needs it?

Paramount, Showtime, CBS Spend Weekend Fighting in Grandpa Sumner Redstone's Sandbox of Death

Tom Cruise Owes Sumner Redstone Lunch Again After Scathing 'Tropic Thunder' Cameo

Oh, now we get it: That Polo Lounge power summit last week between Tom Cruise and Sumner Redstone was not the prodigal-son mea culpa we thought it was, smoothing the waters on which Cruise would coast back into the safe harbor of Redstone's reeling Viacom flagship. Rather, it was just a quick bite to catch up about Katie, Suri, Laurie and maybe for Cruise to apologize in advance for his scathing, fat-suited cameo as a depraved studio boss in Tropic Thunder:

At an industry screening Tuesday night of the forthcoming comedy Tropic Thunder from Paramount Pictures and its unit DreamWorks, Tom Cruise brought down the house with his surprise portrayal of a bald, hairy-chested, foulmouthed, dirty-dancing movie mogul of the kind who is only too happy to throw an actor to the wolves when his popularity cools. ...

Tom Cruise Lunches With Sumner Redstone, Calls Dibs on DreamWorks' Parking Spots

Report: Steven Spielberg And Sumner Redstone's Love Affair Could Be Over

Perhaps the only Hollywood marriage more troubled than that of the Writers Guild and the studios is the turbulent union between the DreamWorks team and the well-monied Paramount lovers into whose welcoming embrace Steven Spielberg and David Geffen happily threw themselves two Christmases ago. Though Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman's public celebration of Spielberg as "the greatest filmmaker—nay, the greatest human being—of all time" seemed like it might be an attempt to save their ill-fated partnership, Radar passes along the latest "Steven is so out of there" chatter:

"He's gone, and he's not going to be missed," one knowledgeable insider tells Radar. Word is, Viacom chief Sumner Redstone—who made headlines in 2006 for canning Tom Cruise after his off-screen antics became a liability—has struck again.

Fox Happy To Be Relieved Of The Money-Losing Burden Of Producing Scripted TV

· Giving the thousands of writers who will descend upon the Fox lot for tomorrow's mass picket a little extra motivation, News Corp. president Peter Chernin claims that his network will save more money from unpaid deals, story, and pilot costs than it stands to lose during a strike. It remains to be seen whether or not Chernin will follow through on a threat to further taunt the WGA by playing a loop of American Idol's theme music at deafening volumes during tomorrow's gathering. [Variety]
·"In the digital domain, content still rules," said Sumner Redstone in a speech touting Viacom's bold commitment to exploring an internet space that he expects "won't yield enough revenue to pay writers for at least the next five or six decades of my life." [THR]

Getting To Know Philippe Dauman, Sumner Redstone's Right-Hand Hatchetman

Sunday's LAT provides the world with the fascinating backstory of Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman, the proudly uncool corporate kamikaze responsible for carrying out the public relations suicide missions Sumner Redstone dreams up while partially hypnotized by staring too intently at his collection of exotic fish, such as suing Google for copyright infringement, replacing a wildly popular executive, or blaspheming a Hollywood deity. But more impressive than the French-speaker's childhood language-acquisition skills (he learned English from Saturday morning cartoons!) and stunning promotion from kindergarten to Columbia Law School (there may have been a stop in college we're forgetting, but we don't have time to go back and double-check that part of the bio) is Dauman's uncanny ability to stay in the good graces of his notoriously prickly boss:

Dauman also is suspect because he holds the world record for getting along with Sumner M. Redstone, the crusty autocrat who built Viacom and looms Zeus-like from his hilltop mansion in Beverly Hills as executive chairman and lead shareholder of Viacom and its sister company, CBS Corp.

Catching Up With The Feuding Redstones

With the once-boiling conflcit between cold-hearted Viacom CEO Phillippe Dauman and the insufficiently treasured DreamWorks team he offended with those two now-infamous little words (indeed, "completely immaterial" will soon totally replace "fuck you" in the Hollywood vernacular) momentarily reduced to a public simmer, there's now time to check in on the status of another intramural corporate spat that recently made headlines. According to today's LAT, Sumner and Shari Redstone, the feudingist first family in all of show business, called a truce in their ongoing succession battle long enough to celebrate a happy occasion over Labor Day:

But in August the Redstones privately agreed to a cooling-off period until after the Labor Day weekend, when Shari's 25-year-old daughter, Kimberlee, was to be married.

Sumner and his wife, Paula, attended the Sept. 2 ceremony at the Inter-Continental Boston Hotel, where heart-shaped fireworks lit up the Boston Harbor.

DreamWorks Ani Extends Bird Viacomward, Takes On Tom Freston

· Thumbing its nose at coldhearted, Spielberg-disrespecting corporate partner Viacom, DreamWorks Animation names legendary Sumner Redstone shitcanee Tom Freston to its board of directors. That'll teach you not to fuck with a national treasure, unfeeling new CEO Phillppe Dauman! [Variety]
· Now here's some casting chatter we can get behind: Jessica Biel is "in talks" to play Wonder Woman in Warner Bros.' comic book megamovie Justice League of America, a project that may include other DC heroes like Superman (but not Brandon Routh), Batman (ditto on Bale), the Flash, and Aquaman. [Variety]
· In lower-budgeted comic book project news involving stars further down Hollywood's alphabetical hierarchy, Dominic West, Doug Hutchison and Wayne Knight join Lionsgate's new Punisher feature. [THR]
· The season premieres of Heroes and Dancing with the Stars both build on last season's debuts, while new CBS "look at how socially inept smart people are!" sitcom Big Bang Theory (seriously, will those geeks ever get laid? We can't handle the delicious tension!) actually drawing a bigger number than lead-in How I Met Your Mother. [Variety]
· Conspicuously silenced Emmy blasphemer Sally Field is attached to play Mary Todd Lincoln opposite Liam Neeson's Abe in Steven Spielberg's slow-developing Lincoln biopic. [THR]

As we can think of no better way to kick off a sunny Friday morning than by contemplating the staggering wealth of the Hollywood multibillionaires who can buy and sell all of us like so much cattle, we spent some time with The Forbes 400, the magazine's ranking of the absolute richest of the American rich, to check in on how some of the industry's best-monied overlords are growing their intimidating cash hoards.

Battle Between Sumner Redstone And Daughter Fizzling, But Bar Fight With God Could Be Brewing

While we were secretly hoping that the ongoing feud between filicidal Viacom overlord Sumner Redstone and traitorous offspring Shari would end with an executive futilely attempting to pry the ageless patriarch's bony fingers from his rebellion-fomenting daughter's throat, it now seems that their battle might end without a death in the family. Slate's Kim Masters reports that the conflict seems like it may "blow over," but gets some company insiders to handicap how the fight might've turned out had it continued:

Another Viacom veteran who's a fan of Shari's says she's like Dad—smart, hardworking, and opinionated. Still, this person adds, "taking on a man who has all the stock" may not be all that smart. "I could argue, 'You're right, Shari—the board isn't really independent,' " this observer says. "There ain't nothing you can do. If he wants to make his salary $20 million a year, there ain't shit you can do."

Inside The Redstones' Battle For Control Of Viacom

Having dispatched nearly all of the greedy blood relations looking to get their filthy little hands on the staggering fortune he's accumulated over centuries of hard work, immortal Viacom pharaoh Sumner Redstone may now find himself locked in battle with his most formidable foe to date. Failing to show adequate appreciation for the precious gift of life he bestowed upon her decades ago, daughter Shari Redstone is reportedly resisting her father's efforts to oust her from the corporate empire she hoped to one day inherit. The LAT reports on the rumored Viacom succession fight:

Unlike the other disputes, however, the father-daughter feud clouds the succession picture. For years, it was practically a given that Shari Redstone would run the company after her father's death.

Instead, fractures started showing.

"She'd be in good stead sometimes and sometimes not," a person familiar with the situation said. "That was the roller coaster she was riding."

The Emmys Didn't Totally Ignore 'Studio 60'

· While underappreciated Aaron Sorkin masterwork Studio 60 was not, as we falsely represented earlier, a nominee for the Best Drama Emmy, the show did pull in a respectable five nods, including one for Eli Wallach in the role of Blacklisted, Alzheimer's Afflicted Writer Who Tries to Steal a Photograph That Has Meaning to Him. [Variety]
· Hollywood NepotismWatch: Shari Redstone, daughter of semi-mummified Viacom overlord Sumner Redstone, may leave the board of the company over a "falling out," though her spokesperson denies she's going anywhere, "even if she has to wait another 300 years for the old man to collapse into a pile of dust in his desk chair" to finally get control of his empire. [THR]
· Ray Liotta now old enough to play Jessica Biel's father. Oh, how the years fly by! [Variety]
· A two-hours So You Think You Can Dance handily defeats ABC's talent-show block of Do People Really Do Celebrity Impressions Anymore? and Insane Asylum Show and Tell: The Search For America's Next Top Inventor. [THR]
· Emmy voters virtually ignore network abomination The CW, which earned a single nom for sound editing in Smallville. [Variety]

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