Hollywood Week: Paramount, Warners, Netflix Saga, Golden Globe Winners, Oscar Announcements, Timothy Busfield, Scott Adams

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Category: Haute This Issue

Published on Saturday, 17 January 2026 11:35

Written by Janet Walker

Paramount-Skydance, who filed a motion in a Delaware court to expedite the discovery proceedings into how the streaming giant Netflix arrived at the valuation behind its superior and winning shareholder deal for Warner Bros., has been denied.

Paramount Saga Continues

Paramount-Skydance Chief David Ellison, the son of Oracle founder Larry Ellison, who is one of the richest men on the planet, received a setback this week in its effort to launch a hostile takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery.

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Warner Bros., Chief David Zaslav continues to reject Paramount's repeated offers, which left the company no option but to seek redress in court, believing they were shut out of the process, and the all-cash offer of $108 Billion, was disregarded without fair review.

The two entertainment companies battled it out in the press with Ellison stating, "WBD has failed to include any disclosure about how it valued the Global Networks stub equity, how it valued the overall Netflix transaction, how the purchase price reduction for debt works in the Netflix transaction, or even what the basis is for its 'risk adjustment' of our $30 per share all-cash offer, " reported Yahoo! Finance.com.

In reply, Warner Bros., explained that even as Paramount Skydance has sent out a number of press releases it has failed to "raise the price or address the numerous and obvious deficiencies of its offer," and noted that Paramount has yet to offer more than $30 per-share. The legal challenges are used as a stall tactic for the Paramount team to regroup.

Both Netflix and Warner Bros have included in the deal structure, termination fees, as did former Paramount owner Shari Redstone. Should Netflix fail to gain regulatory approval the streaming giant has agreed to pay Warner Bros., $5.8 billion, and conversely Warner's is obligated to a $2.8 breakup fee should they back away from the deal.

The entirety of the deal seems to hinge on debt financing, with the Paramount deal heavily financed, from multiple sources, and even when dealing with the son of one of the wealthiest men in the world, they are not using their own capital to secure the company, they are borrowing, essentially on the value, which creates a high risk of collapse.

"Warner Bros' board has argued that Paramount's offer hinges on a significant amount of debt financing that ‍heightens the risk of closing and the offer "remains inadequate," Reuters reported.

Media sources have reported that Netflix is preparing an $83 billion all-cash offer, which hovers around $27.75 per share and removes the stock component. This move would expedite the voting process and bypass the in-depth stock accounting procedure, which would mean a more streamline path to shareholder voting and expected shareholder approval of the deal. If Netflix does switch its bid to an all-cash offer, a vote by shareholder could be as soon as February.

Danielle Brooks, Lewis Pullman To Announce 98th Oscars® Nominations

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Oscar Announcements

Oscar®-nominated actor Danielle Brooks and actor Lewis Pullman will announce the 98th Oscars® Nominations in all 24 categories in a live presentation, beginning at 5:30 AM, from the Academy's Samuel Goldwyn Theater, on Thursday, January 22, via global live stream on Oscar.com, Oscars.org. 

The 98th Oscars will be held on Sunday, March 15, 2026, at the Dolby® Theatre at Ovation Hollywood and will be televised live on ABC, streamed live on Hulu and airs live in more than 200 territories worldwide.

Golden Globe Winners

The Golden Globes were held this week, and while there were some surprises, the awards followed what has been seen as a pattern emerging throughout this Awards season. As the Golden Globes split categories, as the season narrows the nominees are narrowed to smaller categories resulting in the best of this year's films, and performances.

For a complete list of film and television nominees and winners in all categories can be seen here.

The Golden Globes – Complete List of Winners

Timothy Busfield Detained

Actor and director Timothy Busfield, 68, following by a brief disappearance and after his New York upstate residence was raided, turned himself in to the Albuquerque, New Mexico, authorities who issued a warrant for his arrest.

The allegations facing Busfield include two counts of criminal sexual contact with a minor stemming from "and one count of child abuse — all stemming from accusations that he abused twin boys while working on "The Cleaning Lady," a Fox crime drama series [. . .] Court documents [also] refer to multiple alleged incidents for which Busfield has not been charged: that he assaulted a 17-year-old girl who worked as an extra on "Little Big League" in the 1990s, battered a woman in a movie theater in 2012, and abused a 16-year-old girl who was auditioning at his Sacramento theater around 2001," reported The Washington Post.

The fallout from the newest allegations continue as Busfield has been dropped from his longtime representation, Innovative Artists.  The allegations are extremely serious and carry a sentence if Busfield is convicted of decades in prison.

The recent failure of the Albuquerque prosecution in the prosecution of Alec Baldwin for the murder of Director of Photography Halyna Hutchins, on the set of the movie Rust, has created a more diligent effort by prosecutors to ensure all procedures are strictly followed.

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Scott Adams, Dilbert Creator, Dies

Scott Adams, cartoonist and creator of the once widely popular "Dilbert" comic strip, died this week after a personal battle with prostate cancer. He was 68.

Adams, who did not disclose his cancer diagnosis, until former President Joe Biden disclosed his own cancer battel with the disease, explained, once you go public, you become "the dying cancer guy."

"His former wife Shelly Miles Adams announced his death in a live stream Tuesday morning, reading a statement she said Mr. Adams had prepared before his death. "I had an amazing life," the statement said in part. "I gave it everything I had,"' reported The Washington Post.

Adams, who began his career working at Pacific Bell in the 1980s, where his beloved alter-ego "Dilbert," was conceived, as he began doodling whom he described has a potato shaped, undistinguishable, cog in the cubicle world wheel. Soon Adams began to share his drawings with his colleagues, and even management saw the humor in his comics.

It wasn't long after "Dilbert," a three-panel comic strip, became appearing in daily newspapers around the world. At one point Adams' "Dilbert" was appearing in 2000 newspapers daily. As a creator he decided to introduce other characters into the office world Dilbert inhabited, which soon became his downfall.

Prior to the introduction of a black character in the strip, Dilbert was largely based on the cube world of corporate America, primarily filled with unmemorable Caucasian men, each of whom dressed alike, acted alike, had the same feelings of being overlooked, underpaid, and unappreciated.

Dilbert continued to reflect the world of the ever changing workforce, and by 2022, Adam's who like the mythical Greek tragedy character Icarus, Adams flew too close to the sun and his marvelous wax wings melted, and his comments of race and race relations, struck a chord and spiked the public's temperature resulting in his comic strip being cancelled by hundreds of newspapers.

It wasn't the end of "Dilbert" nor of Adam's new found right wing popularity. Each found a new home, and both Adams' and Dilbert found ways to intrigue readers and listeners.

While Adams' hoped "Dilbert" wouldn't be his legacy the success of the cube guy, will far outlast his other works, including "two novellas he had written, "God's Debris" (2001) and the sequel "The Religion War" (2004)."

Adams passed away on January 13, 2026.

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Janet Walker is the publisher, founder, and sole owner of Haute-Lifestyle.com. A graduate of New York University, she has been covering international news through the Beltway Insider, a weekly review of the nation's top stories, for more than a decade.  A general beat writer/reporter and entertainment/film critic, she is also an accomplished news/investigative news/crime reporter and submitted for Pulitzer Prize consideration "Cops Conspire to Deep Six Sex Assaults" in the Breaking News Category and was persuaded to withdraw the submission. Ms. Walker has completed five award-winning screenplays "The Six Sides of Truth," "The Assassins of Fifth Avenue," "The Wednesday Killer," "The Manhattan Project," and the sci-fi thriller "Project 13: The Last Day." She has also published "Unholy Alliances: A True Crime Story," a non-fiction narrative, "Days, Times, Seasons, and Events: A Collection of Poetry & Prose," and "Songs of Freedom: A Collection of Biblical Teachings," which can be purchased here. She is a member of the Authors Guild, the Los Angeles Press Club, the National Writers Union, and a member of the International Federation of Journalists.