Channing Dungey To Remain With Studios & Streaming Post-WBD Split; Few Executives With Dual Responsibilities Make For Clean Break
One of Warner Bros Discovery's top TV executives, Channing Dungey, who is Chairman and CEO, Warner Bros. Television Group and U.S. Networks, has found herself straddling the two sides of the company that will become separate entities next year: Streaming & Studios and Global Networks.
Preempting speculation about her future, Dungey addressed the matter in an internal memo soon after the WBD split was announced Monday morning, sources tell Deadline.
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'Warner Bros Television Group will become part of Streaming & Studios, and I'm thrilled that I will continue to have the privilege of leading WBTVG,' Dungey wrote in the memo, Deadline has learned.
Dungey is the highest-profile TV executive with dual responsibilities across the studio and cable networks. One of her top lieutenants, WBTV veteran Brett Paul, is in a similar position in his role as President of WBTVG and Chief Operating Officer of U.S. Networks.
There is no clarity on his future as of now, but sources indicate Paul would also likely stay with Studios & Streaming as the chief dealmaker for Warner Bros TV and a key member of Dungey's senior team.
Unlike Comcast's spinoff of cable networks into Versant — a split from NBCUniversal that has to untangle decades of shared history and close ties — the WBD separation is a lot less complicated.
Following Discovery's 2022 acquisition of WarnerMedia, all cable networks, including WarnerMedia's TNets, were put under Kathleen Finch, Chairman and CEO, U.S. Networks, in a unit that has functioned largely independently from Warner Bros TV, HBO and streamer HBO Max.
It was not until Finch announced her retirement at the end of last year that the line between divisions was crossed, with Dungey taking over Finch's role and Paul adding COO for U.S. Networks to his duties of WBTVG President.
There have been some joint programming initiatives since including a run of The Pitt, WBTV's drama series for Max, on TNT.
It is unclear whether Dungey would get additional responsibilities as she continues in her role as Chairman and CEO, Warner Bros. Television Group post-split, which also is a question for Paul should he also remain in his WBTVG role as expected.
Besides Dungey and Paul, there is little executive overlap between the two soon-to-be stand-alone divisions as most operations, including programming, finance, marketing and PR, have been kept separate.
Suzanna Makkos, who served as head of Original Comedy & Animation at Max and Adult Swim, left in January to become head of comedy for ABC Entertainment and Hulu Originals. There is no longer a hybrid comedy role across both Max and Adult Swim, a block on Cartoon Network, which will be part of the Global Networks company.
Also, David Leavy, longtime close confidant to WBD Discovery David Zaslav, recently departed as COO of CNN — another Global Networks brand — to return to parent WBD. That would allow him to continue to work for Zaslav, who has been named CEO of Studios & Streaming, with WBD CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels named CEO of Global Networks.
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