https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/ Mon, 01 Jun 2026 02:18:50 +0000 MyBB https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-15.html Sat, 31 Jan 2026 05:07:18 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-15.html By Rebecca Rubin

Steven Spielberg has lined up his next feature film, which will be released in 2026.

Universal Pictures is backing the movie, which will open in theaters on May 15, 2026. It’s unclear what the untitled project — which the studio described as a “new original event film” — is about, though Variety previously reported that Spielberg is working on a UFO story.

David Koepp, whose previous work with the filmmaker includes “Jurassic Park,” “War of the Worlds” and “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” is writing the script from a story by Spielberg. Kristie Macosko Krieger will produce the film.

Spielberg, who does not need much of an introduction, is Hollywood’s most commercially successful filmmaker, having helmed blockbusters like “Jaws” and “E.T.,” on top of the “Indiana Jones” and “Jurassic Park” franchises. He’s also a three-time Oscar winner for “Schindler’s List” and “Saving Private Ryan.”

He most recently directed “The Fabelmans” for Universal. Inspired by Spielberg’s own upbringing, the story followed a film-obsessed teenager growing up in Arizona and Northern California. Though “The Fabelmans” received several Oscar nominations, it struggled at the box office, earning just $45 million worldwide.

Spielberg’s film before that, 2021’s “West Side Story,” also hit the wrong notes at the box office with $76 million globally against its $100 million budget. The musical adaptation hit the big screen as COVID was surging, which didn’t help, but post-pandemic moviegoing habits haven’t been kind to films aimed at older audiences.

As movie theaters crawl toward a comeback, Spielberg will perhaps reclaim his crown as the king of summer blockbusters.

https://variety.com/2024/film/news/steve...236014435/]]> By Rebecca Rubin

Steven Spielberg has lined up his next feature film, which will be released in 2026.

Universal Pictures is backing the movie, which will open in theaters on May 15, 2026. It’s unclear what the untitled project — which the studio described as a “new original event film” — is about, though Variety previously reported that Spielberg is working on a UFO story.

David Koepp, whose previous work with the filmmaker includes “Jurassic Park,” “War of the Worlds” and “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” is writing the script from a story by Spielberg. Kristie Macosko Krieger will produce the film.

Spielberg, who does not need much of an introduction, is Hollywood’s most commercially successful filmmaker, having helmed blockbusters like “Jaws” and “E.T.,” on top of the “Indiana Jones” and “Jurassic Park” franchises. He’s also a three-time Oscar winner for “Schindler’s List” and “Saving Private Ryan.”

He most recently directed “The Fabelmans” for Universal. Inspired by Spielberg’s own upbringing, the story followed a film-obsessed teenager growing up in Arizona and Northern California. Though “The Fabelmans” received several Oscar nominations, it struggled at the box office, earning just $45 million worldwide.

Spielberg’s film before that, 2021’s “West Side Story,” also hit the wrong notes at the box office with $76 million globally against its $100 million budget. The musical adaptation hit the big screen as COVID was surging, which didn’t help, but post-pandemic moviegoing habits haven’t been kind to films aimed at older audiences.

As movie theaters crawl toward a comeback, Spielberg will perhaps reclaim his crown as the king of summer blockbusters.

https://variety.com/2024/film/news/steve...236014435/]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-14.html Sat, 31 Jan 2026 04:20:10 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-14.html By Andreas Wiseman
January 23, 2026 3:29am

Iron Lung, the buzzed-about low-budget sci-fi horror from YouTuber Markiplier, is adding to its international release plan.

Piece of Magic Entertainment is now aboard to release from Jan 30 in Germany, Austria, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Czechia, Slovakia, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. As previously announced, the U.S., UK, Australia and Canada will also release on the same date.

Piece Of Magic was also an international partner on Taylor Swift film The Official Release Party of a Showgirl.

As my colleague Anthony D’Alessandro recently reported, Markiplier is self-distributing in the U.S. where the film could be on course to take a stunning $9M-10M on debut, despite a minimal P&A spend and a grassroots campaign that has harnessed the subject’s millions of social followers. After initially being lined up for just a handful of cinemas, the movie is expected to open on 2,000+ screens due to demand. Pre-sales are reported to stand at $5M+.

Iron Lung was produced, written, and directed by Markiplier who also stars. Based on the breakout indie horror game of the same name by David Szymanski, the story unfolds in a post-apocalyptic future following ‘The Quiet Rapture’, an event that causes stars and habitable planets to vanish. The synopsis continued: “A desperate attempt to explore an ocean of blood on a desolate moon unfolds when a convicted individual is sealed inside a decaying submarine nicknamed the Iron Lung — a descent into dread that becomes as psychological as it is physical”. Co-starring are Caroline Rose Kaplan, Troy Baker, Elsie Lovelock.

https://deadline.com/2026/01/markiplier-...236694309/]]> By Andreas Wiseman
January 23, 2026 3:29am

Iron Lung, the buzzed-about low-budget sci-fi horror from YouTuber Markiplier, is adding to its international release plan.

Piece of Magic Entertainment is now aboard to release from Jan 30 in Germany, Austria, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Czechia, Slovakia, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. As previously announced, the U.S., UK, Australia and Canada will also release on the same date.

Piece Of Magic was also an international partner on Taylor Swift film The Official Release Party of a Showgirl.

As my colleague Anthony D’Alessandro recently reported, Markiplier is self-distributing in the U.S. where the film could be on course to take a stunning $9M-10M on debut, despite a minimal P&A spend and a grassroots campaign that has harnessed the subject’s millions of social followers. After initially being lined up for just a handful of cinemas, the movie is expected to open on 2,000+ screens due to demand. Pre-sales are reported to stand at $5M+.

Iron Lung was produced, written, and directed by Markiplier who also stars. Based on the breakout indie horror game of the same name by David Szymanski, the story unfolds in a post-apocalyptic future following ‘The Quiet Rapture’, an event that causes stars and habitable planets to vanish. The synopsis continued: “A desperate attempt to explore an ocean of blood on a desolate moon unfolds when a convicted individual is sealed inside a decaying submarine nicknamed the Iron Lung — a descent into dread that becomes as psychological as it is physical”. Co-starring are Caroline Rose Kaplan, Troy Baker, Elsie Lovelock.

https://deadline.com/2026/01/markiplier-...236694309/]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-13.html Sat, 31 Jan 2026 04:17:55 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-13.html Markiplier’s low-budget indie horror adaptation ‘Iron Lung’ will open January 30 on more than 2,500 screens and shows are already selling out. Here’s why audience is the new infrastructure.
By Dana Harris-Bridson
January 14, 2026 10:00 am

Have you heard about “Iron Lung”? A low-budget adaptation of an indie horror game, booked to open on more than 2,500 screens January 30, with showings sold out weeks in advance?

Probably not. “Iron Lung” is a self-distributed movie from a first-time feature filmmaker. No paid marketing campaign. The people who do know about it (and who pressured theaters to book it) are his audience. And in this story, they’re the only ones who really matter.

The filmmaker is Markiplier. If you know him, you really know him. If you don’t, here’s the short version:

Mark Fischbach (known online as Markiplier) has about 38 million YouTube subscribers. He’s been building that audience for more than a decade, making gaming videos, comedy, and increasingly ambitious narrative projects. He tours. He has a clothing brand, Cloak. He made large-scale interactive series for YouTube Originals. He writes, directs, edits, produces, finances, and stars in much of his own work.

And now he’s opening a feature film in wide theatrical release, through his own production and distribution company, Markiplier Studios, by essentially turning his audience into the distribution engine.

This story is not “any filmmaker can do this”; they can’t. But it is a story about what happens when audience, authorship, and access collapse into one person, and what that reveals about the real bottlenecks in film.

Mark as the Starting Point
Markiplier is not a YouTuber who decided to dabble in film; he’s been moving toward longer-form storytelling for years. Similarly, his audience didn’t show up for “Iron Lung” because he suddenly asked them to; they’ve been watching him level up in public for more than a decade.

“My whole channel [is] mostly the narrative journey of me as a creative just building skills,” he said. “What my audience really like is the evolution of the craft. I am getting better at this over time and they can see that journey.”

After approaching the game’s creator, David Szymanski, Markiplier began developing “Iron Lung” in late 2022; the 35-day SAG low-budget shoot was in spring 2023. That’s a long pause between postproduction and debut, but Markiplier did almost everything himself.

“I don’t think that I made it any more efficient,” he said. “[But] the skills I’ve built in the past few years of doing this dwarfed the entirety of my time on YouTube.”

Mark talked to distributors, but the offers didn’t align with what he believed his audience could deliver. “I know that I’ve sold to them before,” he said. “I’ve gone on tour and I’ve sold out theaters, so I know that I can get people to show up. I was like, ‘Yeah, I can bet on myself for this one.’”

That’s where Centurion Film Service enters the story.

Have you heard about “Iron Lung”? A low-budget adaptation of an indie horror game, booked to open on more than 2,500 screens January 30, with showings sold out weeks in advance?

Probably not. “Iron Lung” is a self-distributed movie from a first-time feature filmmaker. No paid marketing campaign. The people who do know about it (and who pressured theaters to book it) are his audience. And in this story, they’re the only ones who really matter.

The filmmaker is Markiplier. If you know him, you really know him. If you don’t, here’s the short version:

Mark Fischbach (known online as Markiplier) has about 38 million YouTube subscribers. He’s been building that audience for more than a decade, making gaming videos, comedy, and increasingly ambitious narrative projects. He tours. He has a clothing brand, Cloak. He made large-scale interactive series for YouTube Originals. He writes, directs, edits, produces, finances, and stars in much of his own work.

And now he’s opening a feature film in wide theatrical release, through his own production and distribution company, Markiplier Studios, by essentially turning his audience into the distribution engine.

This story is not “any filmmaker can do this”; they can’t. But it is a story about what happens when audience, authorship, and access collapse into one person, and what that reveals about the real bottlenecks in film.

Related Stories
"Iron Lung"
‘Iron Lung’ Review: Markiplier’s Slow Burn Video Game Adaptation Offers a Fascinating, Flawed Experiment
MERCY, the movie, stars Chris Pratt sitting in a chair
Oh ‘Mercy’ — A Cold Spell Froze Out the Box Office This Weekend, but It Can Get Worse
Mark as the Starting Point
Markiplier is not a YouTuber who decided to dabble in film; he’s been moving toward longer-form storytelling for years. Similarly, his audience didn’t show up for “Iron Lung” because he suddenly asked them to; they’ve been watching him level up in public for more than a decade.

“My whole channel [is] mostly the narrative journey of me as a creative just building skills,” he said. “What my audience really like is the evolution of the craft. I am getting better at this over time and they can see that journey.”

After approaching the game’s creator, David Szymanski, Markiplier began developing “Iron Lung” in late 2022; the 35-day SAG low-budget shoot was in spring 2023. That’s a long pause between postproduction and debut, but Markiplier did almost everything himself.


“I don’t think that I made it any more efficient,” he said. “[But] the skills I’ve built in the past few years of doing this dwarfed the entirety of my time on YouTube.”

Mark talked to distributors, but the offers didn’t align with what he believed his audience could deliver. “I know that I’ve sold to them before,” he said. “I’ve gone on tour and I’ve sold out theaters, so I know that I can get people to show up. I was like, ‘Yeah, I can bet on myself for this one.’”

That’s where Centurion Film Service enters the story.


Exhibitors Didn’t Think This Was Possible, Either
Mark’s manager, Ben Curtis, approached film-buying veteran Bill Herting’s Centurion to handle the theater bookings. Bill’s been in the exhibition business for a half century; he was a buyer for majors like General Cinema and Cineplex-Odeon and has operated his own service company for the last 30 years. Today, he sounds a little stunned by what Markiplier created.

“I hope it’s a glimpse of the future because there’s some magic pixie dust going on here,” Herting said. “And I don’t think it’s just a one-off.”

It took a while for Markiplier to convince Herting that was the case.

“I hope he doesn’t think I’m throwing shade on him about this, but when I first started talking to him he was like, ‘Yeah, we’ll start in three theaters and we’ll see how it goes from there.” And I was trying to be like, ‘This is not ego. I’m so sorry to say this, but I have an audience of millions. It would be insultingly low — not to me, to them — to be like three.’”

As Herting spoke with theater owners, he realized Markiplier was right. Many knew who he was, or had employees who did.

“That’s when Bill started really understanding where I was coming from,” Markiplier said. “I was like, ‘I really do have an audience and I’ve seen them in person. They exist, I swear.'”

In a week, the theater count grew from 60 to 600. From there, it kept climbing.

“Trailer goes up Friday [December 5],” said Sam Herting, Bill’s son and partner in Centurion. “Friday night, [bookings] are really starting to roll in. Saturday, I’m just booking theaters all day until one or two in the morning. And then it kept up.”

Markiplier pinned the trailer at the top of his channel with a message: “The final trailer for the Iron Lung movie. Only in theaters January 30, 2026. Reserve your ticket now https://ironlung.com.” That points to a landing page built by Mark’s wife, Amy Fishbach, with an interactive map showing where the film would play.  (Locations are marked by Mark’s screaming face.)

However, fans didn’t just check the map. They called theaters. And called and called. So much that theaters complained.

“One of the big circuits said, ‘Could you do me a favor? Could you tell [Mark’s] fans to stop calling the theaters? You got to turn those bots off,’” said Bill. “It wasn’t bots.”

At this writing, the count stands around 2,511 theaters in the U.S. and Canada, with hundreds more in Australia, New Zealand, and the U.K. Sam said the final figure in North America could be 2,800 by opening day.

“We figured this would be concentrated in the bigger cities,” Bill said. “Uh-uh…  We’re getting calls from South America, France, Spain, Norway, Sweden. Germany.”

Added Sam, “It’s one thing to have a lot of followers. But loyalty of the followers is another thing. Mark’s fans are just so ride-or-die for him.”

Bill put it more bluntly. “The loyalty. The loyalty. The loyalty,” he said. “That’s the differentiator.”

What Actually Drove the Explosion
There’s been no paid media campaign or ad buy. Mark did the marketing by doing what he does — or as he said, “boiling that spring.”

For the last two years he’s been mentioning the project, sharing progress, and letting anticipation build. Then he cut the first trailer: 10 million views. Second trailer: 10 million views.

However, this isn’t virality; the success is relational. As Sam pointed out, a lot of creators have tried theatrical.

“We’ve seen some YouTubers try theatrically and the results haven’t been quite there yet compared to this,” he said. “It’s one thing to have a lot of followers, but loyalty of the followers is another thing.”

Bill (carefully) compared Markiplier’s theatrical cause-and-effect to “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour.” “I’ll call it Swiftian a little bit… something I think our industry desperately needs,” he said. “No one can get around the marketing bug. It’s plaguing the little guys, it’s plaguing the big guys.”

What This Does Not Solve
To be clear, most filmmakers are not Markiplier with 38 million subscribers, a decade of audience trust, and the experience of touring and selling tickets directly to fans.

His model does not fix financing for filmmakers without audience, marketing costs for unknown projects, discoverability for first-time directors, or the structural inequities in visibility.

Even Mark doesn’t think independence is always the answer. “If I can build a good relationship with a studio that respects creative control, that’s the kind of relationship I want to build.” (To dream the impossible dream.)

What This Opens Up
From a structural perspective, Mark did this:

• He earned their trust over time.
  
• He built an audience first.
  
• He invited them into the process.
  
• He gave them tools to act.
  

The happy ending isn’t about distribution, but demand. Mark didn’t persuade theaters; his audience did. To me, that suggests the new flex isn’t filmmakers who can evade gatekeepers; it’s the filmmakers who can offer proof.

Centurion really didn’t have to sell “Iron Lung.” They only had to make it available with no strings attached, which left exhibitors more inclined to take a shot. “We were very open about it,” Bill said. “‘No rules. Just put it on sale the Thursday night before. If it doesn’t work, no harm, no foul.’ Exhibitors like to hear that.”

However, once theaters began to sell out, the FOMO kicked in. “Film buyers have extreme FOMO,” Bill said. “If something’s popping, they got to jump on it.”

What Filmmakers Can Learn
Markiplier’s version of marketing was years of producing in public. “The repetition of that is what got me to this point,” he said.

Not every filmmaker should be a YouTuber, but Markiplier’s experience reveals some new laws of gravity.

Audience can’t be an afterthought.
Process can be part of the story.
Visibility is built long before release.
Trust compounds.
“Iron Lung” isn’t a blueprint, but it signals that audience is the new leverage. Creator loyalty can rival, or even beat, distributor scale.

I don’t expect that Hollywood will morph into a motley crew of DIY distributors. I do believe that audience is the new infrastructure because it represents power and if you don’t have it, someone else does.

Some films will move through studios, others via creators, or communities, or brands. Lower budgets may the new black (they look good on everybody), but the winners will be the work that has people waiting.


https://youtu.be/IaEtA56pd_w
https://www.indiewire.com/news/analysis/...235172987/]]> Markiplier’s low-budget indie horror adaptation ‘Iron Lung’ will open January 30 on more than 2,500 screens and shows are already selling out. Here’s why audience is the new infrastructure.
By Dana Harris-Bridson
January 14, 2026 10:00 am

Have you heard about “Iron Lung”? A low-budget adaptation of an indie horror game, booked to open on more than 2,500 screens January 30, with showings sold out weeks in advance?

Probably not. “Iron Lung” is a self-distributed movie from a first-time feature filmmaker. No paid marketing campaign. The people who do know about it (and who pressured theaters to book it) are his audience. And in this story, they’re the only ones who really matter.

The filmmaker is Markiplier. If you know him, you really know him. If you don’t, here’s the short version:

Mark Fischbach (known online as Markiplier) has about 38 million YouTube subscribers. He’s been building that audience for more than a decade, making gaming videos, comedy, and increasingly ambitious narrative projects. He tours. He has a clothing brand, Cloak. He made large-scale interactive series for YouTube Originals. He writes, directs, edits, produces, finances, and stars in much of his own work.

And now he’s opening a feature film in wide theatrical release, through his own production and distribution company, Markiplier Studios, by essentially turning his audience into the distribution engine.

This story is not “any filmmaker can do this”; they can’t. But it is a story about what happens when audience, authorship, and access collapse into one person, and what that reveals about the real bottlenecks in film.

Mark as the Starting Point
Markiplier is not a YouTuber who decided to dabble in film; he’s been moving toward longer-form storytelling for years. Similarly, his audience didn’t show up for “Iron Lung” because he suddenly asked them to; they’ve been watching him level up in public for more than a decade.

“My whole channel [is] mostly the narrative journey of me as a creative just building skills,” he said. “What my audience really like is the evolution of the craft. I am getting better at this over time and they can see that journey.”

After approaching the game’s creator, David Szymanski, Markiplier began developing “Iron Lung” in late 2022; the 35-day SAG low-budget shoot was in spring 2023. That’s a long pause between postproduction and debut, but Markiplier did almost everything himself.

“I don’t think that I made it any more efficient,” he said. “[But] the skills I’ve built in the past few years of doing this dwarfed the entirety of my time on YouTube.”

Mark talked to distributors, but the offers didn’t align with what he believed his audience could deliver. “I know that I’ve sold to them before,” he said. “I’ve gone on tour and I’ve sold out theaters, so I know that I can get people to show up. I was like, ‘Yeah, I can bet on myself for this one.’”

That’s where Centurion Film Service enters the story.

Have you heard about “Iron Lung”? A low-budget adaptation of an indie horror game, booked to open on more than 2,500 screens January 30, with showings sold out weeks in advance?

Probably not. “Iron Lung” is a self-distributed movie from a first-time feature filmmaker. No paid marketing campaign. The people who do know about it (and who pressured theaters to book it) are his audience. And in this story, they’re the only ones who really matter.

The filmmaker is Markiplier. If you know him, you really know him. If you don’t, here’s the short version:

Mark Fischbach (known online as Markiplier) has about 38 million YouTube subscribers. He’s been building that audience for more than a decade, making gaming videos, comedy, and increasingly ambitious narrative projects. He tours. He has a clothing brand, Cloak. He made large-scale interactive series for YouTube Originals. He writes, directs, edits, produces, finances, and stars in much of his own work.

And now he’s opening a feature film in wide theatrical release, through his own production and distribution company, Markiplier Studios, by essentially turning his audience into the distribution engine.

This story is not “any filmmaker can do this”; they can’t. But it is a story about what happens when audience, authorship, and access collapse into one person, and what that reveals about the real bottlenecks in film.

Related Stories
"Iron Lung"
‘Iron Lung’ Review: Markiplier’s Slow Burn Video Game Adaptation Offers a Fascinating, Flawed Experiment
MERCY, the movie, stars Chris Pratt sitting in a chair
Oh ‘Mercy’ — A Cold Spell Froze Out the Box Office This Weekend, but It Can Get Worse
Mark as the Starting Point
Markiplier is not a YouTuber who decided to dabble in film; he’s been moving toward longer-form storytelling for years. Similarly, his audience didn’t show up for “Iron Lung” because he suddenly asked them to; they’ve been watching him level up in public for more than a decade.

“My whole channel [is] mostly the narrative journey of me as a creative just building skills,” he said. “What my audience really like is the evolution of the craft. I am getting better at this over time and they can see that journey.”

After approaching the game’s creator, David Szymanski, Markiplier began developing “Iron Lung” in late 2022; the 35-day SAG low-budget shoot was in spring 2023. That’s a long pause between postproduction and debut, but Markiplier did almost everything himself.


“I don’t think that I made it any more efficient,” he said. “[But] the skills I’ve built in the past few years of doing this dwarfed the entirety of my time on YouTube.”

Mark talked to distributors, but the offers didn’t align with what he believed his audience could deliver. “I know that I’ve sold to them before,” he said. “I’ve gone on tour and I’ve sold out theaters, so I know that I can get people to show up. I was like, ‘Yeah, I can bet on myself for this one.’”

That’s where Centurion Film Service enters the story.


Exhibitors Didn’t Think This Was Possible, Either
Mark’s manager, Ben Curtis, approached film-buying veteran Bill Herting’s Centurion to handle the theater bookings. Bill’s been in the exhibition business for a half century; he was a buyer for majors like General Cinema and Cineplex-Odeon and has operated his own service company for the last 30 years. Today, he sounds a little stunned by what Markiplier created.

“I hope it’s a glimpse of the future because there’s some magic pixie dust going on here,” Herting said. “And I don’t think it’s just a one-off.”

It took a while for Markiplier to convince Herting that was the case.

“I hope he doesn’t think I’m throwing shade on him about this, but when I first started talking to him he was like, ‘Yeah, we’ll start in three theaters and we’ll see how it goes from there.” And I was trying to be like, ‘This is not ego. I’m so sorry to say this, but I have an audience of millions. It would be insultingly low — not to me, to them — to be like three.’”

As Herting spoke with theater owners, he realized Markiplier was right. Many knew who he was, or had employees who did.

“That’s when Bill started really understanding where I was coming from,” Markiplier said. “I was like, ‘I really do have an audience and I’ve seen them in person. They exist, I swear.'”

In a week, the theater count grew from 60 to 600. From there, it kept climbing.

“Trailer goes up Friday [December 5],” said Sam Herting, Bill’s son and partner in Centurion. “Friday night, [bookings] are really starting to roll in. Saturday, I’m just booking theaters all day until one or two in the morning. And then it kept up.”

Markiplier pinned the trailer at the top of his channel with a message: “The final trailer for the Iron Lung movie. Only in theaters January 30, 2026. Reserve your ticket now https://ironlung.com.” That points to a landing page built by Mark’s wife, Amy Fishbach, with an interactive map showing where the film would play.  (Locations are marked by Mark’s screaming face.)

However, fans didn’t just check the map. They called theaters. And called and called. So much that theaters complained.

“One of the big circuits said, ‘Could you do me a favor? Could you tell [Mark’s] fans to stop calling the theaters? You got to turn those bots off,’” said Bill. “It wasn’t bots.”

At this writing, the count stands around 2,511 theaters in the U.S. and Canada, with hundreds more in Australia, New Zealand, and the U.K. Sam said the final figure in North America could be 2,800 by opening day.

“We figured this would be concentrated in the bigger cities,” Bill said. “Uh-uh…  We’re getting calls from South America, France, Spain, Norway, Sweden. Germany.”

Added Sam, “It’s one thing to have a lot of followers. But loyalty of the followers is another thing. Mark’s fans are just so ride-or-die for him.”

Bill put it more bluntly. “The loyalty. The loyalty. The loyalty,” he said. “That’s the differentiator.”

What Actually Drove the Explosion
There’s been no paid media campaign or ad buy. Mark did the marketing by doing what he does — or as he said, “boiling that spring.”

For the last two years he’s been mentioning the project, sharing progress, and letting anticipation build. Then he cut the first trailer: 10 million views. Second trailer: 10 million views.

However, this isn’t virality; the success is relational. As Sam pointed out, a lot of creators have tried theatrical.

“We’ve seen some YouTubers try theatrically and the results haven’t been quite there yet compared to this,” he said. “It’s one thing to have a lot of followers, but loyalty of the followers is another thing.”

Bill (carefully) compared Markiplier’s theatrical cause-and-effect to “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour.” “I’ll call it Swiftian a little bit… something I think our industry desperately needs,” he said. “No one can get around the marketing bug. It’s plaguing the little guys, it’s plaguing the big guys.”

What This Does Not Solve
To be clear, most filmmakers are not Markiplier with 38 million subscribers, a decade of audience trust, and the experience of touring and selling tickets directly to fans.

His model does not fix financing for filmmakers without audience, marketing costs for unknown projects, discoverability for first-time directors, or the structural inequities in visibility.

Even Mark doesn’t think independence is always the answer. “If I can build a good relationship with a studio that respects creative control, that’s the kind of relationship I want to build.” (To dream the impossible dream.)

What This Opens Up
From a structural perspective, Mark did this:

• He earned their trust over time.
  
• He built an audience first.
  
• He invited them into the process.
  
• He gave them tools to act.
  

The happy ending isn’t about distribution, but demand. Mark didn’t persuade theaters; his audience did. To me, that suggests the new flex isn’t filmmakers who can evade gatekeepers; it’s the filmmakers who can offer proof.

Centurion really didn’t have to sell “Iron Lung.” They only had to make it available with no strings attached, which left exhibitors more inclined to take a shot. “We were very open about it,” Bill said. “‘No rules. Just put it on sale the Thursday night before. If it doesn’t work, no harm, no foul.’ Exhibitors like to hear that.”

However, once theaters began to sell out, the FOMO kicked in. “Film buyers have extreme FOMO,” Bill said. “If something’s popping, they got to jump on it.”

What Filmmakers Can Learn
Markiplier’s version of marketing was years of producing in public. “The repetition of that is what got me to this point,” he said.

Not every filmmaker should be a YouTuber, but Markiplier’s experience reveals some new laws of gravity.

Audience can’t be an afterthought.
Process can be part of the story.
Visibility is built long before release.
Trust compounds.
“Iron Lung” isn’t a blueprint, but it signals that audience is the new leverage. Creator loyalty can rival, or even beat, distributor scale.

I don’t expect that Hollywood will morph into a motley crew of DIY distributors. I do believe that audience is the new infrastructure because it represents power and if you don’t have it, someone else does.

Some films will move through studios, others via creators, or communities, or brands. Lower budgets may the new black (they look good on everybody), but the winners will be the work that has people waiting.


https://youtu.be/IaEtA56pd_w
https://www.indiewire.com/news/analysis/...235172987/]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-12.html Sun, 25 Jan 2026 18:28:48 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-12.html

1. Syndication using the RSS Syndication tool is permitted for blogs, publishers, and writers on a limited scale.
   
2. Publishers with s paid membership may use the RSS Syndication tool without limitations.
   
3. Contact us for commercial use of the content on Hollywood Press Releases using the RSS Syndication tool--or any other manner--at contact@hollywoodpressreleases.com and request more information.
   

Do note that the content on Hollywood Press Release is publicly available information. We only charge for commercial use when using the syndication to cover use of the tool, hours spent maintaining the press release archives, and utility costs. Generally, purchasing the membership will cover most businesses. If we see that the RSS Syndication tool is being used beyond what is considered normal use then we will recommend using a commercial use agreement.]]>

1. Syndication using the RSS Syndication tool is permitted for blogs, publishers, and writers on a limited scale.
   
2. Publishers with s paid membership may use the RSS Syndication tool without limitations.
   
3. Contact us for commercial use of the content on Hollywood Press Releases using the RSS Syndication tool--or any other manner--at contact@hollywoodpressreleases.com and request more information.
   

Do note that the content on Hollywood Press Release is publicly available information. We only charge for commercial use when using the syndication to cover use of the tool, hours spent maintaining the press release archives, and utility costs. Generally, purchasing the membership will cover most businesses. If we see that the RSS Syndication tool is being used beyond what is considered normal use then we will recommend using a commercial use agreement.]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-11.html Sun, 04 Jan 2026 19:08:17 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-11.html Reach Millions With One Click
Watch Video To See How It Benefits You


Get published on Google News, AP News, USA TODAY Network, & 100+ NBC, FOX, ABC & CBS affiliates
Reach journalists and media influencers
Feed Large Language Models and AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini
Build lasting visibility with SEO and AI discoverability
Target countries & industry verticals with precision
Place your news in global databases & newswires
Distribute in any language for global reach
Save with affordable, cost-effective pricing
Pay as you go with no subscriptions

https://www.einpresswire.com/
https://www.newsmatics.com/


Press Release Pricing
Save money when buying in bulk.

PRICING (as 1/4/26)
$149/1 press release ($149 per press release)
$499/5 press releases plus 1 free ($83.17 per press release)
$999/15 press releases ($66.60 per press release)]]> Reach Millions With One Click
Watch Video To See How It Benefits You


Get published on Google News, AP News, USA TODAY Network, & 100+ NBC, FOX, ABC & CBS affiliates
Reach journalists and media influencers
Feed Large Language Models and AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini
Build lasting visibility with SEO and AI discoverability
Target countries & industry verticals with precision
Place your news in global databases & newswires
Distribute in any language for global reach
Save with affordable, cost-effective pricing
Pay as you go with no subscriptions

https://www.einpresswire.com/
https://www.newsmatics.com/


Press Release Pricing
Save money when buying in bulk.

PRICING (as 1/4/26)
$149/1 press release ($149 per press release)
$499/5 press releases plus 1 free ($83.17 per press release)
$999/15 press releases ($66.60 per press release)]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-10.html Fri, 02 Jan 2026 14:11:48 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-10.html By Patrick Reilly
Published Jan. 2, 2026
Updated Jan. 2, 2026, 6:37 a.m. ET

Victoria Jones, the late daughter of Hollywood legend Tommy Lee Jones, was initially believed to have been drunk when she was found lying unresponsive on the ground at a San Francisco Hotel New Year’s Day, according to a report.

Jones, 34, was found on the 14th floor of the ritzy Fairmont hotel by a guest who thought she had was passed out from drinking and alerted hotel staff, a source told the Daily Mail.

Staffers immediately began CPR and called for an ambulance — but paramedics declared her dead at the scene when they arrived.

Police arrived at the Fairmont San Francisco hotel around 3:14 a.m. on Thursday after a report of a medical emergency, according to the San Francisco Police Department.

There was no signs of foul play and no drug paraphernalia was found at the scene, the source told the Daily Mail. There was also no indication her death was a suicide.

The Medical Examiner will determine the cause of her death, cops said.

It’s still not clear if she was a guest at the hotel or how she wound up on the 14th floor.

Jones was the daughter of “No Country for Old Men” actor and his first wife, Kimberlea Cloughley.

Jones, who appeared on screen with her father when she was younger, was arrested at least three times in the past year, according to records obtained by The Post.

In April, she was busted in Napa County for obstructing a peace officer, being under the influence of a controlled substance, and possession of a narcotic controlled substance, court documents show.

Then in May she was arrested in Santa Cruz County and in June back in Napa County she was busted on domestic battery and domestic violence/elder abuse charges and was later released on bail.

Jones pleaded not guilty in both cases out of Napa County, according to court records.]]> By Patrick Reilly
Published Jan. 2, 2026
Updated Jan. 2, 2026, 6:37 a.m. ET

Victoria Jones, the late daughter of Hollywood legend Tommy Lee Jones, was initially believed to have been drunk when she was found lying unresponsive on the ground at a San Francisco Hotel New Year’s Day, according to a report.

Jones, 34, was found on the 14th floor of the ritzy Fairmont hotel by a guest who thought she had was passed out from drinking and alerted hotel staff, a source told the Daily Mail.

Staffers immediately began CPR and called for an ambulance — but paramedics declared her dead at the scene when they arrived.

Police arrived at the Fairmont San Francisco hotel around 3:14 a.m. on Thursday after a report of a medical emergency, according to the San Francisco Police Department.

There was no signs of foul play and no drug paraphernalia was found at the scene, the source told the Daily Mail. There was also no indication her death was a suicide.

The Medical Examiner will determine the cause of her death, cops said.

It’s still not clear if she was a guest at the hotel or how she wound up on the 14th floor.

Jones was the daughter of “No Country for Old Men” actor and his first wife, Kimberlea Cloughley.

Jones, who appeared on screen with her father when she was younger, was arrested at least three times in the past year, according to records obtained by The Post.

In April, she was busted in Napa County for obstructing a peace officer, being under the influence of a controlled substance, and possession of a narcotic controlled substance, court documents show.

Then in May she was arrested in Santa Cruz County and in June back in Napa County she was busted on domestic battery and domestic violence/elder abuse charges and was later released on bail.

Jones pleaded not guilty in both cases out of Napa County, according to court records.]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-9.html Fri, 02 Jan 2026 14:05:56 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-9.html By MARJORIE HERNANDEZ, US WEST COAST NEWS EDITOR and SAMEER SURI, US SENIOR SHOWBUSINESS REPORTER and MELISSA KOENIG, US REPORTER
Published: 00:01 EST, 2 January 2026 | Updated: 08:32 EST, 2 January 2026

The daughter of Hollywood icon Tommy Lee Jones was found dead by a guest at an upscale San Francisco hotel early on New Year's Day.

Victoria Jones, 34, was lying on the ground of the 14th floor of the Fairmont hotel in San Francisco when a guest who thought she might be drunk alerted hotel staff, a source told the Daily Mail.

The staffers quickly realized Victoria was unresponsive and immediately started CPR and called for an ambulance.

The daughter of Hollywood icon Tommy Lee Jones was found dead by a guest at an upscale San Francisco hotel early on New Year's Day.

Victoria Jones, 34, was lying on the ground of the 14th floor of the Fairmont hotel in San Francisco when a guest who thought she might be drunk alerted hotel staff, a source told the Daily Mail.

The staffers quickly realized Victoria was unresponsive and immediately started CPR and called for an ambulance.

By 2002, she made her movie debut with a small part in her father's picture Men in Black II.

She would go on to appear in a handful of acting projects as a child, including a 2005 episode of One Tree Hill and a role that same year the Western picture The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, which was directed by her father.

Although she has not acted onscreen since her role as a cheerleader on One Tree Hill, she has attended the occasional red carpet alongside Jones as an adult.

In 2017, she posed proudly at his side at the ArcLight Hollywood for the premiere of his movie Just Getting Started, also starring Morgan Freeman and Rene Russo.

She also made an appearance with her father in October 2017 at the opening of that year's Tokyo International Film Festival, where he was serving as president of the international competition jury.

After directing his daughter in The Three Burials of Melquiades, Jones showered praise on Victoria in an interview promoting the film.

'She’s a good actress, has her SAG card, speaks impeccable Spanish,' he said. 'When she was a baby, I told Leticia, her nurse, to speak to her in Spanish.'

He also related a charming anecdote about having to acclimatize his then 14-year-old daughter to the rigors of working on a Hollywood movie set.

'She had to get up at 5am for her part. One morning, she wouldn’t get out of bed. I said: "Honey, this is work." But she wouldn’t budge,' he told the New Yorker.

'So I fired her. Then, without telling me, the production staff went over and woke her and rushed her out to the set just in time,' he recalled.

Victoria is survived by Jones, Cloughley and her brother, Austin. 

The Daily Mail has contacted Tommy Lee Jones's representatives for comment, as well as the Fairmont San Francisco and the San Francisco Police Department.]]> By MARJORIE HERNANDEZ, US WEST COAST NEWS EDITOR and SAMEER SURI, US SENIOR SHOWBUSINESS REPORTER and MELISSA KOENIG, US REPORTER
Published: 00:01 EST, 2 January 2026 | Updated: 08:32 EST, 2 January 2026

The daughter of Hollywood icon Tommy Lee Jones was found dead by a guest at an upscale San Francisco hotel early on New Year's Day.

Victoria Jones, 34, was lying on the ground of the 14th floor of the Fairmont hotel in San Francisco when a guest who thought she might be drunk alerted hotel staff, a source told the Daily Mail.

The staffers quickly realized Victoria was unresponsive and immediately started CPR and called for an ambulance.

The daughter of Hollywood icon Tommy Lee Jones was found dead by a guest at an upscale San Francisco hotel early on New Year's Day.

Victoria Jones, 34, was lying on the ground of the 14th floor of the Fairmont hotel in San Francisco when a guest who thought she might be drunk alerted hotel staff, a source told the Daily Mail.

The staffers quickly realized Victoria was unresponsive and immediately started CPR and called for an ambulance.

By 2002, she made her movie debut with a small part in her father's picture Men in Black II.

She would go on to appear in a handful of acting projects as a child, including a 2005 episode of One Tree Hill and a role that same year the Western picture The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, which was directed by her father.

Although she has not acted onscreen since her role as a cheerleader on One Tree Hill, she has attended the occasional red carpet alongside Jones as an adult.

In 2017, she posed proudly at his side at the ArcLight Hollywood for the premiere of his movie Just Getting Started, also starring Morgan Freeman and Rene Russo.

She also made an appearance with her father in October 2017 at the opening of that year's Tokyo International Film Festival, where he was serving as president of the international competition jury.

After directing his daughter in The Three Burials of Melquiades, Jones showered praise on Victoria in an interview promoting the film.

'She’s a good actress, has her SAG card, speaks impeccable Spanish,' he said. 'When she was a baby, I told Leticia, her nurse, to speak to her in Spanish.'

He also related a charming anecdote about having to acclimatize his then 14-year-old daughter to the rigors of working on a Hollywood movie set.

'She had to get up at 5am for her part. One morning, she wouldn’t get out of bed. I said: "Honey, this is work." But she wouldn’t budge,' he told the New Yorker.

'So I fired her. Then, without telling me, the production staff went over and woke her and rushed her out to the set just in time,' he recalled.

Victoria is survived by Jones, Cloughley and her brother, Austin. 

The Daily Mail has contacted Tommy Lee Jones's representatives for comment, as well as the Fairmont San Francisco and the San Francisco Police Department.]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-8.html Sat, 27 Dec 2025 22:07:15 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-8.html Agreement marks a significant step in setting meaningful standards for responsible AI in entertainment.
December 11, 2025

As part of this three-year licensing agreement, Sora will be able to generate short, user-prompted social videos that can be viewed and shared by fans, drawing on more than 200 Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars characters.
Agreement will make a selection of these fan-inspired Sora short form videos available to stream on Disney+.
Disney and OpenAI affirm a shared commitment to responsible use of AI that protects the safety of users and the rights of creators.
Alongside the licensing agreement, Disney will become a major customer of OpenAI, using its APIs to build new products, tools, and experiences, including for Disney+, and deploying ChatGPT for its employees.
As part of the agreement, Disney will make a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI, and receive warrants to purchase additional equity.
The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI have reached an agreement for Disney to become the first major content licensing partner on Sora, OpenAI’s short-form generative AI video platform, bringing these leaders in creativity and innovation together to unlock new possibilities in imaginative storytelling.

As part of this new, three-year licensing agreement, Sora will be able to generate short, user-prompted social videos that can be viewed and shared by fans, drawing from a set of more than 200 animated, masked and creature characters from Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars, including costumes, props, vehicles, and iconic environments. In addition, ChatGPT Images will be able to turn a few words by the user into fully generated images in seconds, drawing from the same intellectual property. The agreement does not include any talent likenesses or voices.

Alongside the licensing agreement, Disney will become a major customer of OpenAI, using its APIs to build new products, tools, and experiences, including for Disney+, and deploying ChatGPT for its employees.

As part of the agreement, Disney will make a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI, and receive warrants to purchase additional equity.

Under the agreement, Disney and OpenAI are affirming a shared commitment to the responsible use of AI that protects user safety and the rights of creators. Together, the companies will advance human-centered AI that respects the creative industries and expands what is possible for storytelling.

The transaction is subject to the negotiation of definitive agreements, required corporate and board approvals, and customary closing conditions.

“Technological innovation has continually shaped the evolution of entertainment, bringing with it new ways to create and share great stories with the world,” said Robert A. Iger, CEO, The Walt Disney Company. “The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence marks an important moment for our industry, and through this collaboration with OpenAI we will thoughtfully and responsibly extend the reach of our storytelling through generative AI, while respecting and protecting creators and their works. Bringing together Disney’s iconic stories and characters with OpenAI’s groundbreaking technology puts imagination and creativity directly into the hands of Disney fans in ways we’ve never seen before, giving them richer and more personal ways to connect with the Disney characters and stories they love.”

“Disney is the global gold standard for storytelling, and we’re excited to partner to allow Sora and ChatGPT Images to expand the way people create and experience great content,” said Sam Altman, co-founder and CEO of OpenAI. “This agreement shows how AI companies and creative leaders can work together responsibly to promote innovation that benefits society, respect the importance of creativity, and help works reach vast new audiences.”

Under the license, fans will be able to watch curated selections of Sora-generated videos on Disney+, and OpenAI and Disney will collaborate to utilize OpenAI’s models to power new experiences for Disney + subscribers, furthering innovative and creative ways to connect with Disney’s stories and characters. Sora and ChatGPT Images are expected to start generating fan-inspired videos with Disney’s multi-brand licensed characters in early 2026.

Among the characters fans will be able to use in their creations are Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Lilo, Stitch, Ariel, Belle, Beast, Cinderella, Baymax, Simba, Mufasa, as well as characters from the worlds of Encanto, Frozen, Inside Out, Moana, Monsters Inc., Toy Story, Up, Zootopia, and many more; plus iconic animated or illustrated versions of Marvel and Lucasfilm characters like Black Panther, Captain America, Deadpool, Groot, Iron Man, Loki, Thor, Thanos, Darth Vader, Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Leia, the Mandalorian, Stormtroopers, Yoda and more.

As part of the agreement, OpenAI has committed to continuing its industry leadership in implementing responsible measures to further address trust and safety, including age-appropriate policies and other reasonable controls across the service. In addition, OpenAI and Disney have affirmed a shared commitment to maintaining robust controls to prevent the generation of illegal or harmful content, to respect the rights of content owners in relation to the outputs of models, and to respect the rights of individuals to appropriately control the use of their voice and likeness.]]> Agreement marks a significant step in setting meaningful standards for responsible AI in entertainment.
December 11, 2025

As part of this three-year licensing agreement, Sora will be able to generate short, user-prompted social videos that can be viewed and shared by fans, drawing on more than 200 Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars characters.
Agreement will make a selection of these fan-inspired Sora short form videos available to stream on Disney+.
Disney and OpenAI affirm a shared commitment to responsible use of AI that protects the safety of users and the rights of creators.
Alongside the licensing agreement, Disney will become a major customer of OpenAI, using its APIs to build new products, tools, and experiences, including for Disney+, and deploying ChatGPT for its employees.
As part of the agreement, Disney will make a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI, and receive warrants to purchase additional equity.
The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI have reached an agreement for Disney to become the first major content licensing partner on Sora, OpenAI’s short-form generative AI video platform, bringing these leaders in creativity and innovation together to unlock new possibilities in imaginative storytelling.

As part of this new, three-year licensing agreement, Sora will be able to generate short, user-prompted social videos that can be viewed and shared by fans, drawing from a set of more than 200 animated, masked and creature characters from Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars, including costumes, props, vehicles, and iconic environments. In addition, ChatGPT Images will be able to turn a few words by the user into fully generated images in seconds, drawing from the same intellectual property. The agreement does not include any talent likenesses or voices.

Alongside the licensing agreement, Disney will become a major customer of OpenAI, using its APIs to build new products, tools, and experiences, including for Disney+, and deploying ChatGPT for its employees.

As part of the agreement, Disney will make a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI, and receive warrants to purchase additional equity.

Under the agreement, Disney and OpenAI are affirming a shared commitment to the responsible use of AI that protects user safety and the rights of creators. Together, the companies will advance human-centered AI that respects the creative industries and expands what is possible for storytelling.

The transaction is subject to the negotiation of definitive agreements, required corporate and board approvals, and customary closing conditions.

“Technological innovation has continually shaped the evolution of entertainment, bringing with it new ways to create and share great stories with the world,” said Robert A. Iger, CEO, The Walt Disney Company. “The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence marks an important moment for our industry, and through this collaboration with OpenAI we will thoughtfully and responsibly extend the reach of our storytelling through generative AI, while respecting and protecting creators and their works. Bringing together Disney’s iconic stories and characters with OpenAI’s groundbreaking technology puts imagination and creativity directly into the hands of Disney fans in ways we’ve never seen before, giving them richer and more personal ways to connect with the Disney characters and stories they love.”

“Disney is the global gold standard for storytelling, and we’re excited to partner to allow Sora and ChatGPT Images to expand the way people create and experience great content,” said Sam Altman, co-founder and CEO of OpenAI. “This agreement shows how AI companies and creative leaders can work together responsibly to promote innovation that benefits society, respect the importance of creativity, and help works reach vast new audiences.”

Under the license, fans will be able to watch curated selections of Sora-generated videos on Disney+, and OpenAI and Disney will collaborate to utilize OpenAI’s models to power new experiences for Disney + subscribers, furthering innovative and creative ways to connect with Disney’s stories and characters. Sora and ChatGPT Images are expected to start generating fan-inspired videos with Disney’s multi-brand licensed characters in early 2026.

Among the characters fans will be able to use in their creations are Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Lilo, Stitch, Ariel, Belle, Beast, Cinderella, Baymax, Simba, Mufasa, as well as characters from the worlds of Encanto, Frozen, Inside Out, Moana, Monsters Inc., Toy Story, Up, Zootopia, and many more; plus iconic animated or illustrated versions of Marvel and Lucasfilm characters like Black Panther, Captain America, Deadpool, Groot, Iron Man, Loki, Thor, Thanos, Darth Vader, Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Leia, the Mandalorian, Stormtroopers, Yoda and more.

As part of the agreement, OpenAI has committed to continuing its industry leadership in implementing responsible measures to further address trust and safety, including age-appropriate policies and other reasonable controls across the service. In addition, OpenAI and Disney have affirmed a shared commitment to maintaining robust controls to prevent the generation of illegal or harmful content, to respect the rights of content owners in relation to the outputs of models, and to respect the rights of individuals to appropriately control the use of their voice and likeness.]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-7.html Sat, 01 Nov 2025 18:25:24 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-7.html The costume queen once again transformed for her annual Oct. 31 celebration, this year going as Medusa.
By Kirsten Chuba
October 31, 2025 8:48pm

The Queen of Halloween has done it again.

As midnight neared in New York City on Friday, Heidi Klum revealed yet another stunning costume, this year arriving at her annual Halloween party as Medusa.

Alongside husband Tom Kaulitz — who also appeared in an elaborate look as a knight turned to stone fighting against her — Klum transformed with a headpiece of moving snakes, fangs and a forked tongue, paired with a full snake body suit and a long tail. She wielded a bow and arrow that she playfully aimed at Kaulitz, between sticking her tongue out menacingly at photographers.

Klum is hosting her 24th Halloween bash, presented by Butterfinger and Huluween on Disney+, at Hard Rock Hotel New York’s The Venue on Music Row. The party has become one of the signature events of Spooky Season, as Klum always turns up in a jaw-dropping look — in recent years, she’s transformed into E.T., a peacock, Fiona from Shrek, Jessica Rabbit and famously, a worm.

The model had been dropping Easter eggs for this year’s costume all month on her social media, and recently told Good Morning America, “I’m going to be very ugly — very scary, but very ugly.” She was also giving glimpses at the look throughout the day on Friday, showing off the process on social as her prosthetics and fangs were applied. Klum collaborates on her costumes with prosthetic makeup designer Mike Marino, who won an Emmy this year for his work on The Penguin.

In a video posted to her Instagram showing the behind-the-scenes of last year’s E.T. costume, Klum explained the origins of her signature party, remembering, “It all started about 25 years ago when I was searching for the party in New York City and I thought, ‘I’m going to have to take that one over.'” She added that over the years as the pressure to beat her past costumes has grown, “I have sleepless nights over Halloween, you have no idea. I always hope that it works out.”

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DQf8RRNDF...hare_sheet]]> The costume queen once again transformed for her annual Oct. 31 celebration, this year going as Medusa.
By Kirsten Chuba
October 31, 2025 8:48pm

The Queen of Halloween has done it again.

As midnight neared in New York City on Friday, Heidi Klum revealed yet another stunning costume, this year arriving at her annual Halloween party as Medusa.

Alongside husband Tom Kaulitz — who also appeared in an elaborate look as a knight turned to stone fighting against her — Klum transformed with a headpiece of moving snakes, fangs and a forked tongue, paired with a full snake body suit and a long tail. She wielded a bow and arrow that she playfully aimed at Kaulitz, between sticking her tongue out menacingly at photographers.

Klum is hosting her 24th Halloween bash, presented by Butterfinger and Huluween on Disney+, at Hard Rock Hotel New York’s The Venue on Music Row. The party has become one of the signature events of Spooky Season, as Klum always turns up in a jaw-dropping look — in recent years, she’s transformed into E.T., a peacock, Fiona from Shrek, Jessica Rabbit and famously, a worm.

The model had been dropping Easter eggs for this year’s costume all month on her social media, and recently told Good Morning America, “I’m going to be very ugly — very scary, but very ugly.” She was also giving glimpses at the look throughout the day on Friday, showing off the process on social as her prosthetics and fangs were applied. Klum collaborates on her costumes with prosthetic makeup designer Mike Marino, who won an Emmy this year for his work on The Penguin.

In a video posted to her Instagram showing the behind-the-scenes of last year’s E.T. costume, Klum explained the origins of her signature party, remembering, “It all started about 25 years ago when I was searching for the party in New York City and I thought, ‘I’m going to have to take that one over.'” She added that over the years as the pressure to beat her past costumes has grown, “I have sleepless nights over Halloween, you have no idea. I always hope that it works out.”

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DQf8RRNDF...hare_sheet]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-6.html Sun, 05 Oct 2025 14:54:53 +0000 Hollywood Press Releases]]> https://www.hollywoodpressreleases.com/press-releases/thread-6.html AI 'actor' Tilly Norwood is an innovation nobody asked for
A new AI "actor" is piquing the interest of talent agents. This spells disaster for cinema.


Oct. 3, 2025, 3:00 AM PDT
By Zeeshan Aleem, MSNBC Opinion Writer/Editor
In an announcement that has received massive backlash across Hollywood, Eline Van der Velden, the Dutch founder of what she calls “the world’s first artificial intelligence talent studio,” told a film festival panel over the weekend that her artificial intelligence “actor” Tilly Norwood has received attention from multiple talent agents. It follows Van der Velden’s statement to Broadcast International over the summer that “We want Tilly to be the next Scarlett Johansson or Natalie Portman, that’s the aim of what we’re doing.”

But the public isn’t asking for AI entities to replace human actors.

According to Variety, Van der Velden told the panel at the Zurich Film Festival last weekend that “Tilly” was initially met with skepticism in studio boardrooms, but their interest has increased — and that in the coming months she plans to announce who will represent the AI creation. It’s not clear what contributed to the alleged increased interest in Tilly, but one possibility, assuming it’s true, is that the technological sophistication of an AI-generated video by Van der Velden’s AI company released this summer piqued the curiosity of talent agents and film studios.

Entrepreneurs and the capitalist class are relentlessly seeking to deploy AI in a manner that exceeds its reasonable use cases.

While Van der Velden’s comments at the festival sounded triumphant, NBC News points out that actors across Hollywood have responded with horror and anger. Actors Emily Blunt, Lukas Gage, Melissa Barrera and Kiersey Clemons, for example, have slammed the AI creation.

“Does it disappoint me? I don’t know how to quite answer it, other than to say how terrifying this is,” Blunt said in an interview in response to the news about Tilly. When Blunt was shown an image of Tilly, Blunt responded with shock. “No, are you serious? That’s an AI? Good Lord, we’re screwed. That is really, really scary. Come on, agencies, don’t do that. Please stop. Please stop taking away our human connection.”

“The View” co-host and actor Whoopi Goldberg, one of the rare talents who’s won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony (EGOT), had a different response. She said, “It’s a little bit of an unfair advantage. But you know what? Bring it on. Because you can always tell them from us.”

I don’t share Goldberg’s confidence. The tech is getting so good so quickly — and it’s only going to get better — that it’s conceivable that AI creations could be inserted into movies and shows without some audience members being able to tell they aren’t real.

The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, or SAG-AFTRA, seems vigilant about that possibility, and its statement Tuesday catalogs the many ways AI talent is problematic:

To be clear, 'Tilly Norwood' is not an actor, it’s a character generated by a computer program that was trained on the work of countless professional performers — without permission or compensation. It has no life experience to draw from, no emotion and, from what we’ve seen, audiences aren’t interested in watching computer-generated content untethered from the human experience. It doesn’t solve any 'problem' — it creates the problem of using stolen performances to put actors out of work, jeopardizing performer livelihoods and devaluing human artistry.

At least one talent agency came out and said that it refuses to work with “Tilly Norwood.”

Van der Velden has responded defensively to the condemnations. “To those who have expressed anger over the creation of our AI character Tilly Norwood: she is not a replacement for a human being, but a creative work — a piece of art,” she said. “Just as animation, puppetry, or CGI opened fresh possibilities without taking away from live acting, AI offers another way to imagine and build stories.”

But Van der Velden’s statement is glib nonsense. She has explicitly pitched Tilly as a replacement for human beings — otherwise why liken her to “the next Scarlett Johansson or Natalie Portman”? Why is she fielding talent agents for real actors? What is the value proposition of Tilly Norwood as an “AI actress” if not to resemble a human so much that it could replace a human actor? And what’s in it for film studios and production companies if not replacing humans with a much cheaper alternative?

Using AI technology to replace human actors would not be like depicting a human in a cartoon, which has a clear genre distinction from live-action movies. Nor is it like using puppets or CGI to depict creatures that are clearly understood to not be humans and interact with casts of human actors. The technology, as Blunt’s response suggests, could be imperceptible.

Entrepreneurs and the capitalist class are relentlessly seeking to deploy AI in a manner that exceeds its reasonable use cases in order to maximize profits. This profit motive will incentivize the use of AI “actors.” Even if they aren’t as good, they’ll be cheaper, they won’t unionize, they won’t complain about unfair or unsafe working conditions, they won’t have scheduling conflicts. In other words, there is no obvious limit on their capacity to be exploited.

The artistry of acting stems from a human being transforming into somebody else and drawing from their own experience to tell a story. Actors have different styles and make unique judgment calls based on their bodies, their inner life, their interpretation of screenplays, their organic chemistry with other actors on set — the outcome of how it all comes together will be unpredictable and reflect something specific about all the creators involved. When you replace that with a computer program, there is no craft or magic — only a simulacrum based on the most hollow form of algorithmic mimicry, designed to replace human beings who have ideas and and emotions with a computer program that cannot. We deserve better.

Zeeshan Aleem
Zeeshan Aleem is a writer and editor for MSNBC Daily. Previously, he worked at Vox, HuffPost and Politico, and he has also been published in, among other places, The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Nation, and The Intercept. You can sign up for his free politics newsletter here.]]> AI 'actor' Tilly Norwood is an innovation nobody asked for
A new AI "actor" is piquing the interest of talent agents. This spells disaster for cinema.


Oct. 3, 2025, 3:00 AM PDT
By Zeeshan Aleem, MSNBC Opinion Writer/Editor
In an announcement that has received massive backlash across Hollywood, Eline Van der Velden, the Dutch founder of what she calls “the world’s first artificial intelligence talent studio,” told a film festival panel over the weekend that her artificial intelligence “actor” Tilly Norwood has received attention from multiple talent agents. It follows Van der Velden’s statement to Broadcast International over the summer that “We want Tilly to be the next Scarlett Johansson or Natalie Portman, that’s the aim of what we’re doing.”

But the public isn’t asking for AI entities to replace human actors.

According to Variety, Van der Velden told the panel at the Zurich Film Festival last weekend that “Tilly” was initially met with skepticism in studio boardrooms, but their interest has increased — and that in the coming months she plans to announce who will represent the AI creation. It’s not clear what contributed to the alleged increased interest in Tilly, but one possibility, assuming it’s true, is that the technological sophistication of an AI-generated video by Van der Velden’s AI company released this summer piqued the curiosity of talent agents and film studios.

Entrepreneurs and the capitalist class are relentlessly seeking to deploy AI in a manner that exceeds its reasonable use cases.

While Van der Velden’s comments at the festival sounded triumphant, NBC News points out that actors across Hollywood have responded with horror and anger. Actors Emily Blunt, Lukas Gage, Melissa Barrera and Kiersey Clemons, for example, have slammed the AI creation.

“Does it disappoint me? I don’t know how to quite answer it, other than to say how terrifying this is,” Blunt said in an interview in response to the news about Tilly. When Blunt was shown an image of Tilly, Blunt responded with shock. “No, are you serious? That’s an AI? Good Lord, we’re screwed. That is really, really scary. Come on, agencies, don’t do that. Please stop. Please stop taking away our human connection.”

“The View” co-host and actor Whoopi Goldberg, one of the rare talents who’s won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony (EGOT), had a different response. She said, “It’s a little bit of an unfair advantage. But you know what? Bring it on. Because you can always tell them from us.”

I don’t share Goldberg’s confidence. The tech is getting so good so quickly — and it’s only going to get better — that it’s conceivable that AI creations could be inserted into movies and shows without some audience members being able to tell they aren’t real.

The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, or SAG-AFTRA, seems vigilant about that possibility, and its statement Tuesday catalogs the many ways AI talent is problematic:

To be clear, 'Tilly Norwood' is not an actor, it’s a character generated by a computer program that was trained on the work of countless professional performers — without permission or compensation. It has no life experience to draw from, no emotion and, from what we’ve seen, audiences aren’t interested in watching computer-generated content untethered from the human experience. It doesn’t solve any 'problem' — it creates the problem of using stolen performances to put actors out of work, jeopardizing performer livelihoods and devaluing human artistry.

At least one talent agency came out and said that it refuses to work with “Tilly Norwood.”

Van der Velden has responded defensively to the condemnations. “To those who have expressed anger over the creation of our AI character Tilly Norwood: she is not a replacement for a human being, but a creative work — a piece of art,” she said. “Just as animation, puppetry, or CGI opened fresh possibilities without taking away from live acting, AI offers another way to imagine and build stories.”

But Van der Velden’s statement is glib nonsense. She has explicitly pitched Tilly as a replacement for human beings — otherwise why liken her to “the next Scarlett Johansson or Natalie Portman”? Why is she fielding talent agents for real actors? What is the value proposition of Tilly Norwood as an “AI actress” if not to resemble a human so much that it could replace a human actor? And what’s in it for film studios and production companies if not replacing humans with a much cheaper alternative?

Using AI technology to replace human actors would not be like depicting a human in a cartoon, which has a clear genre distinction from live-action movies. Nor is it like using puppets or CGI to depict creatures that are clearly understood to not be humans and interact with casts of human actors. The technology, as Blunt’s response suggests, could be imperceptible.

Entrepreneurs and the capitalist class are relentlessly seeking to deploy AI in a manner that exceeds its reasonable use cases in order to maximize profits. This profit motive will incentivize the use of AI “actors.” Even if they aren’t as good, they’ll be cheaper, they won’t unionize, they won’t complain about unfair or unsafe working conditions, they won’t have scheduling conflicts. In other words, there is no obvious limit on their capacity to be exploited.

The artistry of acting stems from a human being transforming into somebody else and drawing from their own experience to tell a story. Actors have different styles and make unique judgment calls based on their bodies, their inner life, their interpretation of screenplays, their organic chemistry with other actors on set — the outcome of how it all comes together will be unpredictable and reflect something specific about all the creators involved. When you replace that with a computer program, there is no craft or magic — only a simulacrum based on the most hollow form of algorithmic mimicry, designed to replace human beings who have ideas and and emotions with a computer program that cannot. We deserve better.

Zeeshan Aleem
Zeeshan Aleem is a writer and editor for MSNBC Daily. Previously, he worked at Vox, HuffPost and Politico, and he has also been published in, among other places, The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Nation, and The Intercept. You can sign up for his free politics newsletter here.]]>