| | | | | Exec summary: President Trump is saying the W.H. Correspondents' Dinner was an "embarrassment..." WHCA president Margaret Talev is expressing "regret" about Michelle Wolf's performance... But others are defending Wolf... And let's be honest, there are much more important things going on in this world... | | -- Monday: DOJ vs. AT&T closing arguments in DC...
-- Monday: The Digital Content NewFronts begin in NYC...
-- Monday evening: "Dancing With the Stars" returns on ABC...
-- Tuesday morning: Tony Award nominations!
-- Tuesday after the bell: Apple and Snap earnings...
-- Thursday: World Press Freedom Day. (I'll be speaking at this morning event at the UN and this evening event at Twitter NYC...)
-- Saturday: Cinco de Mayo... | | What will Justice and AT&T say in closing arguments? | | Here's the deal: Closing arguments will start at 11am ET... DOJ lawyers will speak for 90 minutes, then AT&T-Time Warner lawyers for 90 minutes, then the DOJ will have a 15-minute rebuttal. That's it! It could be a long wait for Judge Richard Leon's ruling. A month?
🔌: Hadas Gold and I will be on CNN's "New Day" around 8:45am Monday... | | Meanwhile, two of AT&T's smaller rivals are trying to merge... | | | T-Mobile, the country's No. 3 wireless provider, and Sprint, No. 4, are really doing it... They're really trying to merge "after years of negotiations punctuated by two breakups." Read Aaron Smith and Jackie Wattles' full story here. Will regulators stand in the way? This is a "horizontal merger," historically more sensitive than a "vertical merger" like AT&T-Time Warner. Andrew Jay Schwartzman thinks it will be "difficult" for the companies to win approval... | | Here's the NewFronts schedule | | The NewFronts (upfront ad sales presentations by online publishers) have been reduced from two weeks to one...
Here's when to expect news (and hopefully some surprises) from key companies: NYT, BBC News, Viacom and Twitter's events are on Monday... Disney, Studio 71, Conde Nast, Oath on Tuesday... Hulu, ESPN, Refinery29 on Wednesday... Meredith, Group Nine, Digitas, YouTube on Thursday... | | Big Q's for Apple earnings day | | | Via the NYT: "How much, if any, growth is left in iPhone sales? And now that Apple has repatriated most of the $252 billion it held abroad to comply with the new tax law, how much will it return to shareholders?" | | NBC News may share its "review" this week | | Ari Wilkenfeld is stepping up his pressure on NBC News. He's the attorney representing both the anonymous accuser who triggered Matt Lauer's firing, and ex-anchor Linda Vester, who recently alleged sexual harassment by Tom Brokaw.
In a statement to Variety on Sunday, Wilkenfeld said, "The problem is not just the superstar harassers, it's the top management. The man who runs NBC News today oversaw a news division in which widespread harassment of women was allowed to occur, has appointed himself responsible for investigating and solving the problem."
Wilkenfeld is referring to Andy Lack. But my understanding is that Lack's boss Steve Burke directed general counsel Kim Harris to conduct the ongoing review of the news division. Insiders expect the findings to be shared in the coming days... | | | Wilkenfeld is not the only observer saying an external agency should have been hired. "NBC has handled this matter really poorly with the internal investigation," David Zurawik said on "Reliable Sources." I think they should have gone outside for credibility..." | | -- Speaking of Brokaw: Over the weekend, more current/former colleagues of Brokaw signed an open letter defending him... The letter is causing tension within NBC, as I reported here... (CNNMoney)
-- Is the Joy Reid controversy over? On Saturday she backed away from the "hack" explanation, saying her tech experts "have not been able to prove it." But she also says "I genuinely do not believe I wrote those hateful things..." (CNNMoney)
-- This just in from NFL PR: "2018 NFL Draft sets record for highest rated and most watched draft ever..." (NFL)
-- The Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Morning Program goes to... ABC's "GMA" (Twitter) | | Bob Iger's year just keeps getting better and better... | | | First "Black Panther." Now "Avengers: Infinity War." Bob Iger's $4 billion bet on Marvel keeps paying dividends. With "Solo: A Star Wars Story," Pixar's "The Incredibles 2," "Mary Poppins Returns," and Marvel's "Ant Man and the Wasp" on deck, his year is going to keep getting better... | | Biggest global opening ever | | Frank Pallotta emails: After a decade's worth of storylines and characters, Marvel's "Avengers: Infinity War" broke box office records in almost every way imaginable. "Infinity War" was the biggest global opening bringing in $630 million. That broke the record by nearly $100 million (and that's WITHOUT China).
It was also the biggest domestic opening to date, edging out "Force Awakens..."
-- NEXT WEEKEND: It could become the fastest film to make $1 billion in history... | | More from Frank: "One huge blockbuster can make all the difference at the yearly box office." That's what comScore's senior media analyst, Paul Dergarabedian, told me. Case in point, the 2018 domestic box office went from down 3% to UP 3% thanks to "Infinity War."
-- DOMINANCE: Disney now holds 9 of the top 10 biggest openings ever.
-- PERSPECTIVE: What was the bigger event in America this weekend? The WHCD or "Avengers?" | | Did you laugh, cringe or turn the channel? | | 24 hours and 10,000 hot takes later, what's left to say? To be honest I don't have much to add to the commentary about Michelle Wolf's performance at the White House Correspondents Association's annual dinner.
I think it was funnier than some folks are admitting... but I also think she should have cut a few of the jokes. More importantly, I'm not the comedy police! And MOST importantly, I think it played right into President Trump's hands. He says the media is at war with him... and the stand-up act helps his allies say "he's right."
-- PARTISAN WARFARE: One side bemoans "liberal intolerance." The other side assails "conservative victimhood." For every person offended by Wolf's jokes about Sarah Sanders, there's another person offended by Sanders' mendacity...
-- THE QUESTION ON SUNDAY'S "RELIABLE:" Was the dinner a setback for journalism?
-- REALITY CHECK: The vast majority of Americans did not watch and do not care about this "controversy." But it still matters because the press-president dynamic matters... | | Several DC journalism vets, including Fox's Ed Henry and NBC's Andrea Mitchell, called on the WHCA to apologize for the most controversial portions of Wolf's act... But an apology does not appear to be forthcoming.
Speaking with me on "Reliable Sources," WHCA president Margaret Talev acknowledged that "the comedian reflects on the press corps, but I don't think that the comedian speaks for the press corps."
Talev said she has one regret: "To some extent, those 15 minutes" of comedy "are now defining four hours of what was a really wonderful, unifying night. And I don't want the cause of unity to be undercut." Here's the video of the full interview... | | Later in the day: A WHCA statement | | | Talev said in a Sunday night email to members that Wolf's monologue "was not in the spirit" of the association's mission. Talev said she and Olivier Knox, the WHCA's next president, "are committed to hearing from members on your views on the format of the dinner going forward..." | | Trump: "Put Dinner to rest, or start over!" | | Trump's tweet at 10:38pm ET: "The White House Correspondents' Dinner was a failure last year, but this year was an embarrassment to everyone associated with it. The filthy 'comedian' totally bombed (couldn't even deliver her lines-much like the Seth Meyers weak performance). Put Dinner to rest, or start over!"
Note his mention of Meyers, the WHCD comedian in 2011. That was the time Trump attended the dinner... the time now cited as motivation for Trump's run for office...
--> Over to you, Seth!
-- BTW: Thought experiment: Will Wolf's stand-up act sound "better" or "worse" five years from now? | | Brian Lowry emails: There was obviously plenty of indignation over Wolf's routine, some of it legitimate, much of it self-serving and manufactured. But as I've asked in the past, why does the WHCA bother booking comics, given the long history of such controversy (insert your own quotes if you like) and the risk-reward ratio? Wouldn't a musical act, some "American Idol" finalist with an uplifting story, be less of a headache? It's not like the second-tier names they've been getting help fill the room...
--> Stelter's idea: Maybe two comedians on stage, a more liberal speaker and a more conservative speakers? | | On "Reliable," Anthony Scaramucci claimed the Wolf performance was an "atrocity." My response: C'mon.
Comedians aim to shock and surprise. That's what they do. "I hope that everyone can remember that comedy is meant to be provocative," Talev said earlier in the hour.
And it "doesn't always hit the mark," she added. "Look, comedy is meant to provoke thought and debate. And it certainly has done that. But journalism also is meant to bring people together around common understandings..." | | Speaker Paul Ryan's videotaped message is worth re-reading... It was shown during the dinner... He congratulated WHCD scholarship winners and said they affirm that "the future of journalism is indeed bright."
Ryan said: "My message to the next generation of reporters, it's really simple. Know that what you do matters. There's so much noise out there" (hmm, who's he talking about there?) "but our republic does not work without an informed electorate."
Ryan continued: "Pay attention to the policy not just the personalities. Look at the human impact, not just the horserace. And above all, challenge yourself and challenge us, those of us in public office. Because what you do, it really matters. It provides transparency and accountability. Done right, journalism can not just inform but empower citizens. Of course, we don't always agree on what's right and what's fair, but that push and pull, that makes us both better. It creates a higher standard. It's part of the genius of this country and it will endure through any turbulent time." | | Hadas Gold's sighting at the Garden Brunch on Saturday: "Stormy Daniels' lawyer Michael Avenatti standing back to back to Kellyanne Conway in separate conversations... while a few feet away was Michelle Obama's former chief of staff Tina Tchen..."
Avenatti was everywhere all weekend long. So was Conway. Variety has lots of sightings here... | | On Saturday night POTUS asked his fans in Michigan: "Is this better than that phony Washington White House correspondents' dinner?" The crowd cheered. "I could be up there tonight, smiling like I love, where they're hitting you shot after shot -- these people, they hate your guts..."
His quote can be read two ways... Either he's speaking in the third person, saying journalists hate his guts, or he's saying journalists hate Trump voters. It's ugly either way. But I think we're going to keep hearing this kind of talk all year long. "They hate you:" A GOP talking point for the midterms? | | Vetting is shorthand for "knowing who you're hiring." Don't miss Ashley Parker, Philip Rucker and Josh Dawsey's new story about the lack of Trump W.H. vetting. The headline: "President Trump's loyalty tests cause hiring headaches."
--> Dawsey tweeted: "The FBI vet on Ronny Jackson wasn't done when Trump named him. Senior officials didn't know Rob Porter was even married. But a potential State hire was recently nixed for re-tweeting a 2016 tweet critical of Trump over Access Hollywood." | | -- Stephanie Russell-Kraft beat me to this story: "As EIC of Religion News Service is ousted, staff fears loss of editorial control..." (CJR)
-- I missed this interesting story the other day: "In Sarasota, a pro-gun columnist is also a top editor at the paper..." (Poynter) | | "The Fourth Estate" premiere in NYC | | Liz Garbus premiered the first part of her four-part NYT docuseries "The Fourth Estate" at the closing night of the Tribeca Film Festival on Saturday. This CBS story says it's a "bracing, real-life thriller with shades of 'All the President's Men' (Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross supply the propulsive soundtrack)" giving "a rare view of the day-to-day toil of investigative journalists navigating an unpredictable and ceaseless story."
Spotted: Matthew Blank, David Nevins, A.G. Sulzberger, Jane Rosenthal, Robert De Niro, Grace Hightower, Ann Curry, Dean Baquet, Julie Davis, Mark Mazzetti, Elisabeth Bumiller, Jenny Carchman, Alex Gibney, Stone Phillips, Bill Hamilton, Rebecca Corbett, Clifford Levy, Michael Barbaro, Chris Licht, Jenny Licht, John Heilemannn and many more... | | | "Reliable Sources" highlights | | | A valuable reminder from Molly Ball | | "There has been a backlash to Trump's attacks on the press," TIME's Molly Ball pointed out on "Reliable."
"Yes, I still get angry letters. I've gotten angry letters my entire career as a journalist," she said. "But I also -- what's new is a lot of people saying sort of 'Attagirl,' right? A lot of people saying, 'Please keep doing what you do, it's important.' And it's not liberal or conservative. It's just everyday Americans who have become more alert to the role of the press in their lives and the necessity of the press. And that is nice to hear for a change..." | | How to catch up on the show | | | Read the transcript, listen to the podcast, watch the video clips on CNN.com, or watch the full show via CNNgo or VOD... | | "The Simpsons" surpasses "Gunsmoke" | | | Sunday night's episode of "The Simpsons" was a milestone in TV world! "The Simpsons" passed "Gunsmoke" by "airing show No. 636 -- the most scripted episodes aired by any prime-time series in TV history..." | | "Fear the Walking Dead" hastens makeover with surprise twist | | "The wholesale fourth-season makeover of 'Fear the Walking Dead' continued in the AMC show's third episode, with the sudden and surprising death of an original cast member," Brian Lowry writes.
WARNING: SPOILERS HERE... | | | "I know Obama was Heaven sent, but ever since Trump won, it proved that I could be president," Kanye West raps on a new track titled "Ye vs. The People..." Details here... | | | Email your feedback and thoughts to brian.stelter@turner.com... the feedback helps us improve this newsletter every day... Thanks! | | | | | | |
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