Paramount TV Studios, CBS Studios, and CBS Studios are two of the most recent Hollywood companies to lose their jobs.
Sources claim that Paramount laid off less than 30 employees as a result. These layoffs affect most employees at CBS Studios and Paramount TV Studios. Some CBS staff were also affected. The majority of those affected are from the legal, business, casting and production departments.
Paramount+’s scripted originals group has been subject to a limited number of layoffs. These are being merged into Paramount TV Studios.
The move is not unexpected, as Paramount Global president and CEO Bob Bakish said on the company’s most recent earnings call that they would be looking at how to cut costs and streamline operations. Bakish spoke out specifically about the need for a reexamination of Showtime Networks’ and Paramount TV Studios’ current status during the earnings call.
“We’re always mindful of cost management as a company,” Bakish spoke at the time. They are moving to seize the chance “to reorganize Showtime Networks, Showtime OTT and Paramount Television Studios into other parts of the company.” Bakish stated that such an effort would be to the advantage of “significant cost reductions and advance our strategic agenda.”
Paramount’s latest corporate move is this. David Nevins, the head of Paramount Premium Group announced that he was leaving at the close of the year. As part of his exit, Showtime Networks was moved under Chris McCarthy, while Showtime’s digital OTT operation moved to Paramount Streaming under Tom Ryan. BET, Paramount Television Studios and CBS now report to George Cheeks. George Cheeks was previously the chief content officer at Paramount+ and oversaw news and sport for CBS.
Studios Teams – Thank you for your patience as we’ve organized our new television studios group. I’m reaching out today with an update and a look ahead.
To reiterate, this new structure will feature two independently operated brands – CBS Studios and Paramount Television Studios (PTVS) – led respectively by David Stapf and Nicole Clemens, each with their own separate creative teams. Two dynamic entry points will be maintained for talented creative talents to provide a broad range of content via broadcast, cable and streaming. This allows us to have both dedicated brands as well as divisional/creative leaders, backed up by simplified support operations.
This reorganization will see the Paramount+ scripted Originals creative team report to Nicole. Jana Helman was named head of development at PTVS.
We have identified leaders from important central functions across the entire group that will help us in our creativity and support business operations.
· Finance – Eric Gray will be head of finance for both studios, continuing to report to Bryon Rubin, Chief Operating and Financial Officer for CBS.
· Law – Kim Doneche will oversee Law matters for both studios and continue to report to Christa D’Alimonte, EVP and General Counsel for Paramount Global.
· Production – Kevin Berg will lead CBS Studios and Liz Miller will oversee production for PTVS.
· Business Affairs – Erika Kirkwood will oversee BA for PTVS with Allison Brightman leading for CBS Studios.
· Casting – Deborah Aquila will head casting for PTVS series and Meg Liberman for CBS Studios shows.
Most of the staff members in these centralized areas will be able to work with both CBS and PTVS projects immediately and over time. It is an entirely new way to operate and it will take healthy collaboration between leaders and teams.
Unfortunately, with organizational changes comes the need to let go of respected colleagues. It is difficult to say farewell to friends and colleagues who have made a significant contribution to the studios. Please join me as I thank each one for their immense achievements and contributions. They will be missed by us all, and we wish them every success in their new roles.
Moving forward, we will put the new structure in place and communicate our vision for our studios. We want to share with our external and internal partners the core principles of this new structure.
· Each studio is free to pursue content of all genres for all mediums. There is no one way.
· We want to take full advantage of the Paramount Global broadcast/cable/streaming ecosystem as well as third-party platforms.
· With the international free-to-air networks now part of my purview, both studios will be collaborating more with Maria Kyriacou (UK and Australia) and Dario Turovelzky (LatAm) to see how we can support the company’s increased focus on globalization of content.
The bottom line – we have two prestigious, major studios that are laser focused on being global, multi-platform and collaborative. Furthermore, we are able to offer the platform, framework and resources necessary for being a desirable creative destination.
We are grateful for all that you did to make these brands successful. And I truly appreciate everything you’ll do in the days ahead to take us to even greater heights.
George
Deadline reported the layoffs first.