David Ellison’s Skydance bid in DC for Jezebel-like Warner Bros?

by Quendrith Johnson, Los Angeles Correspondent

Tonight, Skydance/Paramount’s David Ellison is reported by The Guardian's White House Correspondent Hugo Lowell to be in attendance for the MBS White House Dinner at President Trump’s invitation. Trump of course is close to the elder Ellison, Larry Ellison of Oracle, backed up by his hundreds of billions. At $23.50 or thereabouts a share, Skydance’s David Ellison, who bought Paramount sometime in August, has been gunning for Warner Bros.

Source: X @hugolowell

But around that same share threshold, Ellison has also been roundly rejected, reportedly three different times. Warner is worth $58 BN, trading at around $22 a share currently. Now Netflix has jumped into the last waltz for the storied studio, said to be preparing a non-binding offer by Nov. 20. This bid-counter situation echoes that unforgettable 1938 Warner Bros release Jezebel starring Bette Davis, where her goal is to raise her stock between suitors. This sale of Warner Bros is supposed to happen by the third week of December. And you may wonder if Warner Bros, like the Jezebel character, is selling itself before heading off to certain death in the arms of Sora 2.0, or Grok Imagine, or any of the other AI video generators that are about to blow the lid off Hollywood as we know it?

Valuation of some of H’wood’s biggest players in the arena...  Screenmancer Generated (data available publicly)

But back to David’s father Larry for moment, because many believe he’s backing the WB bid. Larry Ellison has always been an odd duck, even by billionaire standards. Not to mention his two Hollywood-embedded children, Megan, 39, of Annapurna Pictures and of course David, 42, of Skydance/Paramount Global. As the story goes, Larry Ellison once had Steve Jobs as a wedding photographer, not sure which wedding. But he is a self-made man who was also adopted as a child, in line with Steve Jobs connection, also having had a fascinating life. 

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Of the elder billionaire’s two children, Megan Ellison is easier to crack, in that she has a fine artistic pedigree in Hollywood with films like Hill Billy anthem Lawless (Tom Hardy) about the Bondurant bootlegger bunch. Annapurna has earned its creative credentials in town. But who is David Ellison, once under Pixar’s wing, or even personally? There’s not a lot of red carpet shots, nor public access to his life. Here’s a guess.

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So, one could ask if David’s DC dignitary dinner visit is also a move to get backed by MBS and his Saudi (possible) trillions? He’s probably just a few seats away from the formidable Saudi Prince, known only by initials MBS in the West (also feared by every red-blooded journalist, ps).

Yet that digital scourge remains.

Will it whip H’wood's… assets?

What about the feud between Sora and Grok’s founders?

Is this too big a diversion from the Warner Bros ownership stakes, or is it a necessary piece of information for the bigger pixel?

From Open AI (Sam Altman), Sora 2.0 has been updated (9/25 release), and Grok Imagine, the text-to-video monster from Elon Musk, updates daily. In fact, Grok’s Imagine is on the verge of 20 sec short generation on its fast march to full-length feature, Grok’ 4.1 just hit another milestone release in the last few days. Perhaps the infighting between founder here will slow down the infringement on film-making, Hollywood’s stock and trade?

Elon Musk v Sam Altman Feud At-a-Glance 

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No doubt AI video generation is a factor, even if you don’t know anything about the players.

That is to say, what’s Warner Bros or any studio really worth now that the digital gremlins have sprung up in droves?

But let’s get back to that State Dinner happening right now in DC, with the Saudi delegation in town to lay down an alleged $1 Trillion in support of US economic growth. How hard would it be to up David Ellison’s $23.50 to $28 or even $39 or the magic number $40 per share with MBS backing? How would Hollywood react to Paramount-Skydance’s titular head in business with the House of Saud?

More to the point, is it reasonable for the Ellison Oracle heir to own Skydance, Paramount, and Warner Bros?

While our last deep dive focused on Penske heir Jay Penske owning nearly all the Hollywood industry trade magazines and a chunk of award shows, including the Golden Globes, this Ellison purchase is on another level entirely.

If the heart of Hollywood is in the historic trade magazines covering the business and flashy award shows, you could say the soul of Hollywood is its studios, A multi-hyphenated Paramount-Skydance-Warner Bros sounds ominous?

Or some say so, as there are technically five big majors in Hollywood and Ellison would own two out of five, or in a converted percentage, 40% of Hollywood soul. Between the Penske portfolio and the Ellison purchases you wonder, if in the end it all goes sideways, whether most of Hollywood ends up a giant tax write-off for their elder monied counterparts?

Back at the State Dinner, they’re probably clearing the plates by now, setting off for some JFK humidor to raid the cigar vault. While DC may be the hotspot at the moment, with Grok Imagine’s Elon Musk making a surprise appearance at this very same occasion after a frosty absence now thawed, the fire under the Warner Bros sale will heat up again as the third week of December deadline approaches.

Let’s run a chart, accurate as current public sources will allow, on the players and game before Ellison et al return to SoCal for the WB share price smack-down.

The Big Five, and a little backgrounder detail, founders, films per year as of 2024. Screenmancer Generated

And round up of the independents...

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While David Ellison has made a point of being quoted in the media as addressing the “digital transformation” and “its challenges," you wonder if he sees the tip of the digital iceberg and thinks it’s the whole pixel? In other words, who needs a studio when the production, distribution, and even the publicity departments are just vestiges of a bygone era from the Analog Days?Screenmancer Generated

True to the introductory theme, there’s a strange courting period going on in Hollywood, with Warner Bros Jezebel-like charm extended to all suitors. Like the Bette Davis virago, is this glittery studio front offering questionable value over time (i.e.; are the studios really necessary anymore)?

Did someone say that out loud… never mind…

Guess we’ll see come Christmas time, when the music stops and Paramount-Skydance wins or loses yet another bid. Meanwhile, Sora 2.0 and Grok Imagine will have updated many times by then.

To quote Elon Musk? “The most entertaining outcome is the most likely.”

[Editor’s note: the opinions expressed here belong to the author, and do not reflect the views of Screenmancer or FilmFestivals.]

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