'The Fall of Diddy' docuseries examines Sean Combs' shocking fall from grace
Journalist Mara S. Campo, who hosts the after show of 'The Fall of Diddy' docuseries, details her exclusive interview with a former Combs' assistant. The docuseries is airing on Investigation Discovery with episodes available to stream on Max and discovery+. (Jan. 28)
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Warner Bros. Discovery Breakup Cues Hollywood's Latest Succession Drama As Two New Companies Take Shape
Monday's news that Warner Bros Discovery is splitting into two companies – one consisting of studios and streaming, the other linear TV networks – has cued up Hollywood's latest succession drama. David Zaslav, having steered WBD as CEO since the 2022 close of the $43 billion merger of Discovery (which he formerly ran) and WarnerMedia, is slated to be CEO of the 'S&S' (Studios & Streamers) entity. Gunnar Wiedenfels, Warner Bros Discovery's CFO, who held the same post at Discovery and has a pure finance background, has been installed as CEO of the Global Networks company. More from Deadline WBD's David Zaslav, Gunnar Wiedenfels Break Down Split That Will See Standalone Companies 'Free And Clear' For M&A Channing Dungey To Remain With Studios & Streaming Post-WBD Split; Few Executives With Dual Responsibilities Make For Clean Break Warner Bros Discovery To Split Into Two Companies, Streaming & Studios And Global Networks The breakup is expected to formally close by the second half of 2026, and already a host of questions are swirling about the long-anticipated maneuver. Among them: Who will sit in the corner office when all is said and done? For each of new company, M&A could provide that answer. During a call with Wall Street analysts about the transaction, Zaslav said the split 'reflects our belief that each company can now go further and faster apart than they can together.' Wiedenfels said both companies will be 'free and clear' for dealmaking as soon as the split is complete – with no waiting period, unlike when a two-year pause was mandated after WarnerMedia and Discovery combined. While Wiedenfels is respected in finance circles, his new gig overseeing the networks company 'would seem to suggest a focus on financial efficiency and potentially a strategic transaction at some point,' TD Cowen analyst Doug Creutz wrote in a note to clients. Guggenheim's Michael Morris also highlighted the appointment, waggishly anointing Wiedenfels 'Top Gunnar.' Prior to Discovery, the German-born Wiedenfels held finance posts at ProSiebenSat and worked in Hamburg for McKinsey & Co. While he never became the pop-culture villain that Zaslav did, especially among genre fans, he nonetheless managed to provoke the creative community in 2022 by dismissing concerns about the scrapping of a Batgirl movie in order to realize a tax benefit. 'Media likes to talk about media, I guess,' he shrugged at the time. Bumping up the CFO to CEO is a different approach from the one taken by Comcast in assembling the management team for Versant, the NBCUniversal cable network holding company about to spin off from Comcast. Mark Lazarus, the prospective CEO, brings significant operational and programming experience to the role, having headed sports and entertainment across linear networks and streaming. Occasionally, CFOs do ascend to the top job in media companies (Chris Winfrey at Charter Communications is one current example), but it's a tougher road in organizations entrenched in Hollywood. The S&S company is even more of a house of intrigue, not surprisingly given that it has prestige assets like HBO, HBO Max and Warner Bros under its roof. While Zaslav has long coveted movie-mogul status, punctuating that ambition by moving into late Paramount boss Robert Evans' former L.A. home, he has also committed a number of unforced errors. Along with authorize the killing of movies like the completed Coyote vs. Acme (which was recently sold after an outcry), he came close to torpedoing Turner Classic Movies. Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese and a coalition of other A-list filmmakers convinced him otherwise. And there was that bash he and Graydon Carter threw in Cannes during the 2023 Hollywood writers strike, complete with heavy security. One senior exec who worked for Zaslav at Discovery and WarnerMedia told Deadline the split plan had a certain valedictory quality. 'It feels like this is the start of his retirement, at least from this company,' the exec theorized. 'Would he want to run something that's so much smaller than what he had before?' At 65, Zaslav would appear to have another act in him, but some insiders point to his recalling of longtime lieutenant David Leavy last month from CNN to a senior post at the mother ship was a precursor. If Zaslav were to ever step away (a big if for anyone tuning in to NBA or French Open telecasts over the past month, where Zaslav's embrace of celebrities was on full display), who would be candidates to be No. 1? Two names on the short list would be Casey Bloys and Channing Dungey. Both had prominent roles at the company's upfront presentation to advertisers last month in New York. Bloys also earned unusually fulsome praise from Zaslav on WBD's most recent quarterly earnings call. The top exec called the HBO and Max content chief 'a generational talent' and said HBO's current state is not only healthy but the equal to NBC programming during the fabled 'Must-See TV' era. Dungey, meanwhile, sought to pre-empt any speculation that she could leave the fold by sending an internal memo asserting the opposite. 'I'm thrilled that I will continue to have the privilege of leading WBTVG,' the chairman and CEO of Warner Bros Television Group and U.S. Networks wrote. For Wall Street, there are some bigger clouds on the horizon than the haze-covered org chart. 'The broader question is: Why now?' wondered MoffettNathanson analyst Robert Fishman in a note to clients. 'While we are not shocked that the company chose to split up, the timing of the move is more surprising. The announcement raises questions about external pressures. We note the move follows closely on the heels of S&P's recent downgrade of WBD's debt to below investment grade. WBD's depressed stock price likely also played a role, possibly creating urgency around re-rating the equity story through structural change. Regardless of the precise catalyst, we now must wait formal separation documents and more clarity on capital structure.' Investors grew chilly on the deal as Monday's trading day reached its end. After initially roaring up more than 9%, WBD's already-battered stock fell another 2% to close at $9.77. Best of Deadline Sean 'Diddy' Combs Sex-Trafficking Trial Updates: Cassie Ventura's Testimony, $10M Hotel Settlement, Drugs, Violence, & The Feds A Full Timeline Of Blake Lively & Justin Baldoni's 'It Ends With Us' Feud In Court, Online & In The Media Where To Watch All The 'John Wick' Movies: Streamers That Have All Four Films Sign in to access your portfolio
Wall Street Journal
3 hours ago
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Heard on the Street Recap: Splitting Up
Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav will remain as chief executive of the Streaming & Studios company (Mike Blake/Reuters)
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Diddy's ex, 'Jane,' is now his 2nd accuser to describe being sex-trafficked by violence
"Is this coercion?" Combs' ex said he asked her after leaving her covered with bruises last June. Combs' 2nd sex-trafficking accuser, "Jane" told a jury he then forced her to have sex with an escort. "Take this fucking pill," she said he demanded. "You're not going to ruin my fucking night." Sean "Diddy" Combs' ex told a federal jury Monday that the mogul once covered her face in bruises before posing a taunting question: "Is this coercion?" The rap mogul then demanded she put on makeup, pop an ecstasy pill, and have sex with a male escort, the woman, "Jane," testified, describing a June 2024 dinner date at her Los Angeles home. "Take this fucking pill. You're not going to ruin my fucking night," Jane, who is testifying under a pseudonym, said Combs demanded as she screamed, "I don't want to! I don't want to!" Through this harrowing testimony, Jane became the second of Combs' ex-girlfriends, after R&B star Cassie Ventura, to take the stand at his Manhattan trial and describe being sex trafficked through coercive violence. "He just looked at me, right in my face," from an inch away, his voice "forceful," Jane said, when lead prosecutor Maurene Comey asked her to describe how Combs appeared and sounded when he asked her, "Is this coercion?" It was the third day of testimony for Jane, who described herself as an OnlyFans lingerie model and the single mother of a child fathered by one of Combs' rap world rivals. She dated Combs between 2021 and 2024. Jane told the jury Monday that while she took the ecstasy pill on that violent night, she did not answer Combs' question about coercion. Instead, only three months later, federal prosecutors would answer the question for her. Combs would be indicted in September 2024 on racketeering and sex trafficking. Both Ventura and Jane were sex trafficked by means of Combs' false promises, violence, and coercion, according to the indictment. The legal definition of coercion includes any scheme or pattern that causes someone to fear serious harm. Defense lawyers argue that there was no coercion because the sex was consensual. They say that this is borne out by years of texts and emails in which Ventura and Jane display enthusiasm for these drug-fueled nights of sex with as many as three men, plus Combs himself. The racketeering allegations against Combs include bribery and witness tampering, and here Jane's testimony from Monday could also help prosecutors. Jane told the jury that in the days after Ventura filed her explosive November 2023 lawsuit, Combs threatened to send her sex tapes to the father of her child, offered her cash, and pleaded, "I need your friendship." "Charge me. Charge me, so we can just move on," Jane testified that a desperate-sounding Combs told her during a FaceTime call. "He was wanting me to come up with some sort of number," Jane told the jury, describing what she called a rejected offer to pay for her silence. The Ventura lawsuit quickly upended Combs' life and his multimillion-dollar music and lifestyle empire. In it, Ventura accused Combs of forcing her to have sex with male escorts while he watched, masturbated, and filmed. These so-called "freak off" performances involved heavy drug use and lasted for days, Ventura said in the suit, previewing her own testimony at the start of the trial. The lawsuit, which settled the next day for $20 million, was the catalyst for dozens of similar lawsuits and for the indictment itself. "I just reacted, like, I can't believe I'm reading my own story," Jane told the jury Monday, tearfully describing her reaction to reading Ventura's lawsuit for the first time. "I almost fainted," she told the jury. "In fact, I think I did." Combs' reaction to the lawsuit was more extreme than Jane's own, veering, in her description to the jury, from anger to accusation to fear. Before Ventura's lawsuit, Combs would react with scolding denials when she told him she wanted to stop what she called "hotel nights" and to enjoy romantic dinners and trips instead. "You're tripping," he would tell her, according to the texts shown in court. "Please, woman," and "You're fucking crazy," he'd tell her. "So, we're breaking up?" he'd threaten. But in the days after the Ventura lawsuit, Jane couldn't bring up "hotel nights" without Combs asking if she was out to get him. "You trying to set me up?" he asked her in one November 2024 phone call that was recorded by Combs, later recovered from the phone of his chief of staff, Kristina Khorram, and played Monday for the jury. "You recording my phone calls?" he demanded. Jane testified she was not — and that she had no idea that Combs was the one making a recording. In one of two recorded calls, Combs attempted to spin their nights together as "Just some kinky shit that I thought that we, you know, we both enjoyed." When Jane answers, "I just want you to know that's not how I saw things," Combs asks again, "Are you recording me?" Jane's cross-examination is set to begin on Tuesday and may last through Thursday. Read the original article on Business Insider
