Over 1,000 Hollywood Bold-Faced Names Release Open Letter Expressing “Unequivocal Opposition” to Paramount-Warners Deal
Bryan Cranston, J.J. Abrams, Glenn Close, Lin-Manuel Miranda and hundreds of other actors, writers, directors and producers released the letter through a consortium of groups Monday.
Over 1,000 Hollywood bold-faced names released an open letter Monday morning, expressing “unequivocal opposition” to Paramount‘s megadeal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery.
The letter, which was released by a consortium of groups including Norm Eisen’s Democracy Defenders Fund and Jane Fonda’s Committee for the First Amendment, counts a who’s who of signers, including actors like Bryan Cranston, Glenn Close, Ben Stiller, Don Cheadle, Jason Bateman and Ted Danson, directors like J.J. Abrams, Denis Villeneuve and Yorgos Lanthimos, producers like Ted Hope and Mark Duplass, and multihyphenates who include Lin-Manuel Miranda and David Chase.
“This transaction would further consolidate an already concentrated media landscape, reducing competition at a moment when our industries — and the audiences we serve — can least afford it,” the letter states. “The result will be fewer opportunities for creators, fewer jobs across the production ecosystem, higher costs, and less choice for audiences in the United States and around the world. Alarmingly, this merger would reduce the number of major U.S. film studios to just four.
