Variety

BBC Warns of ‘Real Jeopardy’ as License Fee Base Erodes Despite Record-Breaking Content Year

The BBC closed out a year that included its most-watched title in “The Celebrity Traitors” and its best drama debut in three years with “The Night Manager,” but its annual report and accounts for 2025/26 warns the corporation faces “real jeopardy” as license fee erosion drives a third consecutive operating deficit. BBC director general Matt […]

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Variety

‘Bluey’ Helps Power 17% Profit Growth at BBC Commercial

BBC Commercial increased EBITDA by 17% to £267 million ($357.1 million) in the 2025/26 financial year, returning £377 million ($504.2 million) to the BBC as direct-to-consumer services and consumer products, led by “Bluey,” drove growth despite a challenging market. Revenue remained flat at £2.2 billion ($2.94 billion), with growth in some areas offsetting decline in […]

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Hollywood Reporter

‘Bluey,’ BritBox North America, Cost Savings Help Drive BBC Commercial’s Earnings Growth

The commercial arm of the U.K. public broadcaster also touted revenue gains for documentary streaming service BBC Select, consumer products and cost discipline amid "market pressures."

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Hollywood Reporter

The BBC Remains the U.K.’s Leading Media Brand — But License Fee Reform Is Desperately Needed

The broadcaster's Annual Report has arrived and spotlighted extensive funding woes, an uptick in formal bullying and harassment cases, and billions generated for the British economy.

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

The Guardian Culture

Jane Campion remembers Sam Neill: ‘He was radiating peace, beaming love’

The Piano director shares her memories of the actor on set – and the last time she saw him in hospitalSam Neill’s final interview and his life in pictures ‘A true gentleman’: actors, directors and leaders pay tribute to Sam NeillNeill interviewed in 2023, 2024 and 2026Sam. So effortlessly handsome, and that rare thing in New Zealand and Australia: a movie star.My hands actually shook when I met him at a cafe in Vulcan Lane, Auckland, to discuss rehearsals. He had arrived, we all had, to start pr

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Variety

Ellen Burstyn to Receive Venice’s Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement

Ellen Burstyn, whose credits include “The Last Picture Show,” “The Exorcist” and “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore,” will receive the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 83rd Venice Intl. Film Festival, the festival said Tuesday. The festival’s artistic director Alberto Barbera described Burstyn as “an actress of rare intensity and truth,” adding that she […]

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

The Guardian Culture

Synthetic Sincerity review – Marc Isaacs’ AI interrogation grapples with identity and existence

A combination of fact and fiction leaves the celebrated documentarian’s puzzling project about software training wanting for depthMarc Isaacs’ new film is a curious, intriguing, semi-sincere affair that I couldn’t make friends with. It is an odd, shallow piece of work about artificial intelligence that is itself exasperatingly artificial, a self-aware docudrama hybrid. Isaacs is, or rather pretends to be, licensing the vivid characters from his previous, acclaimed documentaries to a fictional AI

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

The Guardian Culture

‘We met and two minutes later we were kissing’ – how Gavin and Stacey became Britain’s most bang tidy TV couple

To kick off Making Love, our new series in which the stars behind TV’s hottest relationships relive their romances, Mathew Horne and Joanna Page talk about meeting the one, snogs with strangers – and saving people’s livesIt’s a classic romcom story: Essex boy from Billericay meets Welsh girl from Barry, they declare their love in a coach station, he proposes in a train station before being dragged away by police and – with the help of a fake-vegetarian mum, a crackin’ friend who had a fling with

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Variety

‘Adolescence’ Co-Creator Jack Thorne, ‘Bridgerton’ Star India Amarteifio, Judi Dench Join National Youth Theatre’s 70th Anniversary Show (EXCLUSIVE)

The U.K.’s National Youth Theatre has unveiled the first wave of stars joining “Letters to My Younger Future Self,” a one-night performance marking the organization’s 70th anniversary. The show is set for Sept. 20 at Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall in London and is supported by Netflix. The lineup for the evening includes BAFTA winner […]

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Hollywood Reporter

Andy Serkis Defends His ‘Hunt for Gollum’ Cast and Confirms He’s Not Directing Stephen Colbert’s ‘Lord of the Rings’ Film

The British actor-filmmaker addressed criticism around the lack of diversity in his 'Lord of the Rings' film, which currently stars Anya Taylor-Joy, Leo Woodall, Kate Winslet and Jamie Dornan.

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Variety

Webtoon Productions, Espotlight Forge First-Look Pact for Spanish-Language Wattpad Adaptations (EXCLUSIVE)

Webtoon Productions and Madrid and Los Angeles-based Espotlight have signed a first-look deal to develop Spanish-language film and TV adaptations of Wattpad webnovels, expanding a partnership that has already produced the internationally released “Boulevard” with Sony Pictures International. Under the deal, Espotlight will receive a first look at Spanish-language stories published on Wattpad, giving the […]

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

The Guardian Culture

They Fight review – boxing drama is an emotional gutpunch

Anchored by an indelible André Holland performance, the film finds tenderness and warmth amid its gritty Washington DC backdropIn the lineage of Creed and Million Dollar Baby, They Fight makes yet another compelling case for why boxing remains a timeless allegory for the human condition. This time it’s Walt (André Holland) who’s staring up at a 10-count. Once a luminary on Washington DC’s boxing scene, Walt saw his promising career derailed by the city’s drug trade. After an extended prison stin

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Variety

‘Stranger Things’ Star Linnea Berthelsen to Make U.K. Stage Debut in ‘Darkling’ (EXCLUSIVE)

Linnea Berthelsen, best known for playing Kali Prasad/008 in the second and final season of Netflix’s smash hit “Stranger Things,” is to make her U.K. stage debut in the “Darkling” at London’s Bush Theatre. The solo play is presented by Actors Touring Company and co-produced with the Bush Theatre. Described as “an epic story of […]

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Hollywood Reporter

Marc Maron, Ilana Glazer, Jordan Klepper, Ms. Pat Among Headliners at New York Comedy Festival

NYCF — launched by Carolines club founder Caroline Hirsch — will see more than 200 comedians perform in 100+ shows at venues across New York from Nov. 6-15.

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Variety

Glassriver, ZDF Studios’ Network Movie Team on Lilja Sigurðardóttir Crime Series ‘Áróra’ (EXCLUSIVE)

Icelandic producer Glassriver is teaming with ZDF Studios-owned Network Movie on “Áróra,” a crime drama series based on Lilja Sigurðardóttir’s internationally bestselling “An Áróra Investigation” novels. Network Movie has optioned all five books in the series — “Cold as Hell,” “Red as Blood,” “White as Snow,” “Dark as Night” and “Deep as Death” — and […]

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

The Guardian Culture

Goodbye Chinatown by Kit Fan review – a chef’s elegy to London

Skipping between London, Shanghai and Hong Kong, this tale of family migration, politics and food has plenty of flavour and fireAmber Fan, the 22-year-old protagonist of Kit Fan’s heartfelt and elegiac second novel, is ready to say goodbye. Goodbye to her parents, who are booked on the midnight flight from London to Hong Kong, there to enjoy their sunset years having sold the family restaurant in London’s Chinatown. And goodbye to the old Chinatown that they and their generation of hard-working

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

The Guardian Culture

Deep Water review – plane-crash survivors play existential roulette with bitey fish

Renny Harlin’s disaster movie brings aquatic mayhem along with suspense and schadenfreude as aircraft passengers battle to survive hungry sharks If done right, a disaster movie can scratch a cinematic itch like nothing else, serving up sentimentality, suspense and schadenfreude in tidy parcels of action. Deep Water, in which an American plane full of minor movie stars crashes in shark-infested waters, knows exactly what it’s doing even as it nods towards a number of predecessors.For starters, th

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Hollywood Reporter

‘Robert Richardson: The White Devil’ Is a “Detective” Doc Deep Dive Into the Cinematographer’s Mind and Heart

Czech cinematographer Jana Hojdová discusses her feature directorial debut, which premiered at Karlovy Vary, pulling double duty at the big fest and what's next for her.

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Variety

Fandango Sales Picks Up Explosive Locarno Premiere ‘The Chilean’ Where ‘Everything Is on the Verge of Detonation’ (EXCLUSIVE)

Fandango Sales has boarded Sergio Castro-San Martín’s “The Chilean” ahead of its world premiere at Locarno.   Set in 1976, the film follows Chilean miner Aldo Marín as he flees Chile’s regime for Turin, where he meets Luciana, a doctor who performs illegal abortions. But his attempt to rebuild his life is threatened by a talent […]

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026

Variety

Hong Sangsoo’s ‘Nowhere to Lay My Eyes’ Lands at Cinema Guild Ahead of Locarno Premiere

Cinema Guild has acquired North American distribution rights to Hong Sangsoo’s “Nowhere to Lay My Eyes.” The film will have its world premiere at the 79th Locarno Film Festival in August. “Nowhere to Lay My Eyes” follows Sanghee (Kim Minhee), who visits her mother on Jeju Island with her brother after 10 years apart. Her […]

entertainment  Jul 14, 2026