Twilight of the Gods at Sun ValleyThe tails between legs among titans. Plus: The symbolic corpse of ICM
If the Masters of the Universe fall in the forest and no one hears them, did they make a sound? The captains of our industry and every other new-fangled, tech-adjacent industry convened in Idaho last week, as usual, for their annual celebration of capitalism's over-achievers; their chance to carve up the world in bucolic peace. A special getway, where reporters know their place to stand in their driveway pen and know that buttonholing the staff for tidbits is a big no-no if they want to be allowed back. Same as it ever was, as they say. But what was interesting about this year is how not important it seemed; how very much not hanging on every pronouncement the world was, our world in particular. The reports trickled out about Elon's finale, and Sheryl's next moves and which mogul said hi to which mogul. These droplets didn't just seem irrelevant to the fate of our world; given where things are, they sound pathetic. As recently as a year ago, things were humming along, paradigms were still operative and for us. The hymnal still paraphrased Dennis Hopper in Waterworld, “Streamingland isn't our destination, it's our destiny!” But today, the world is colored in much darker hues, with uncertainty and second thoughts about this yellow brick road we're on, the order of the day, social disorders swirling around us, and a sense that what we do — which was so long, so central to the esprit of the entire planet — has become inconsequential and disposable. Amidst all this, the Great Men who sent us down this path gather, to congratulate each other and do more wheeling and dealing in pastoral splendor. Today, it all seems so much an attempt to play the role of gods prowling on Mount Olympus while the mortals below gaze up for auguries. And they must assure themselves of their place in the world. Unfortunately, apart from their ability to merge a couple companies and put 30,000-ish people out of work, this is not the room where it's happening anymore. The tides of history have moved on and the glacial changes long ago set in motion will play themselves out, with the moguls left as bystanders to what is to come, Dr. Frankensteins left to be devoured by their own creations. In a way you can see the Sun Valley Confab as a hideous revenge on the capitalist system designed by Karl Marx's restless spirit — climb to the very peak of the financial pyramid and what do you win? A week at a conference center with a bunch of out-of-shape aging white men in performance fleece competing to impress with their conquests.
Aside: and if you doubt that by white men, we literally mean white men — our own Ankler Intern to the Stars Matthew Frank did a back of the envelope on every invitee name we could find reported anywhere. By our count: Of the 211 available names:
Among the “dignitaries”:
The best and the brightest! But hey, you’re rich, I’m rich. Oh, and before we meet up at Augusta next year, my shareholders might like it if I announce a DEI executive. Know anyone? And note to ambitious women and non-white aspiring gods and goddesses everywhere: just Lean In whydontcha! Ask Sheryl Sandberg! Sun Valley’s 2052 invitation is just around the corner! She’s on it!
Anyway, Marx's avenging angel must have felt a little guilty about the hours of workshops he put the mighty through in years past and spared them Mark Zuckerberg's karaoke party at Whiskey Jacques, canceled this year. Hollywood in the thrall of the tech-led culturally out-of-step moguldom has taken what was an unruly but profitable business and mortgaged it for a dream of streaming utopia that we now find, oops, might not ever make any money. Our bad! The industry has never felt more confused and lost about where it is headed, and if you're going to blame someone, some phenomenon, the Allen & Co conference might be a good place to start. So beg your pardon if we're not on the edge of our seats too, excited to hear about how a couple of Great Men have engineered the closing of another historic studio, another few tens of thousands of jobs slashed, more efficiencies carved out, in the name of Scale. More than anything, more than the streaming race, the tech world has led us towards the totem of Scale, in search of monopoly. “Competition is for losers” is how Peter Thiel put it, and the entrants to the streaming war, ignoring the fact that entertainment is monopoly-proof by nature, dreamed of a world in which a company could have such massive clout, it could slip the surly bonds of hits and flops and create flywheels bigger than any old script. The point of scale being — you control pricing or buying power. You have leverage over your suppliers (talent) because you're the only game in town, and you have leverage over your customers, because you're the only game in town. Since time immemorial, the Holy Grail of everyone who brought money into Hollywood has been finding a way that your fate isn't held hostage to something as pathetic as whether a movie is “good” or not. Scale is the latest gizmo to try and break out of the eternal cycle of entertainment — to build a platform so awe-inspiring that the platform itself becomes the product. And after building something more fearsome than anything Hollywood had ever seen, after taking a commanding, seemingly unbreakable, lead in the race, a couple hitless quarters and the bottom was out on Netflix. So the reporting from Sun Valley, such as it was, had it that people were realizing not only did none of the studios achieve escape velocity with the Streaming Pivot, they actually made us more vulnerable to business cycles.
You don't say. These are the people who turned entertainment into content. Who tried to turn deals into the star. In the Sun Valley version, there was nothing aspirational about what Hollywood did. Nothing inspiring. Just give them stuff by the yard and use the algo to figure out how to hook them to the heroin, drive their engagement through the ceiling. Take a look at the transformational companies of Hollywood history. Paramount in the 1910s and 1920s, betting people wanted to see full-length films. MGM in the ’30s, creating a galaxy of stars. RKO and RCA, betting on a future of watching stories on a little box in your home. Paramount in the ’70s, thinking a bunch of little directors turned loose with their “vision” could save a studio. Fox in the ’90s, betting America might be ready for a fourth network. Miramax turning tiny budget films into a business to compete with the majors. HBO thinking the world was ready for television that rivaled and surpassed film. And Netflix — its miracle not to be denied. All these moves seemed like madness by the rulebooks of their day. None of them were about deals, they were about someone, or some company having a gut feeling about what audiences were ready for and taking a huge chance on that. And each changed the business completely, almost on a dime. And sooner than you can imagine, something else is going to come along and change everything again. Maybe it's already happening. One of the only sure rules about entertainment (Ankler Rule #4): The next big thing is always coming. Believing in the power of the Silicon Valley model has brought us to a very perilous place. Maybe it's time we start believing in what we do again. Maybe it's time anyone who refers to what we make as “content” should be sent home, suspended for two weeks without pay. And maybe its time to let our creations lead the way again, as it did when Hollywood meant something to the world. An industry friend wrote: “Before Top Gun, Tom Cruise had a taped message thanking everyone for coming to the theater. I thought 'This is what Hollywood should do more of.' I didn’t even like the movie so much, but I admire that they are trying to say 'This is important to us, and the experience is important, we’re not preaching or complaining, we’re thanking you for being part of it.'“ Or we could just wait for the next deal to explain everything. ICM Who?Where just a week ago, one of the great names of our business proudly hailed itself atop a Century City skyscraper:
Today there is only:
If a picture is worth a thousand words, what is a picture of no words worth? Or a picture of a big blanked-out space where words — or letters — prominently loomed over the Westside days ago? As if a blanket has been covered over the not-yet-cold corpse, so the rest of us can politely avert our eyes. Once again, Hollywood stops not to mourn, as what was just last week, a stalwart half-century-old institution of our community unceremoniously has a sheet thrown over its very name. Nothing terrifies Hollywood like being reminded of those who have lost power. Let the names of our fallen not be spoken in our presence, is every mogul’s prayer. TV vs. Film: The ShowdownDo Not Let This Get Around!  If it gets out that entertainment execs are eligible for knighthood and damehood, there will be no end to it! Can you imagine if Tom Rothman started insisting everyone address him as Sir Thomas? No one would survive! But congratulations to a grande dame of the cinema indeed. Looking forward to Dame Donna classing this place up. New on The Optionist
New on The Ankler.
© 2022 Richard Rushfield
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