HBO chief stays quiet on Paramount future as merger nears close

HBO chief Casey Bloys would not say what he will do when Paramount takes control of HBO. Speaking at Bloomberg's Screentime conference on 1 October, he batted away questions about his title, his role and what happens to the HBO Max and Paramount+ streaming services. He did not bite.

Bloys is Chairman and CEO of HBO and HBO Max Content, according to Deadline. His appearance came two days after Paramount streaming chief Cindy Holland left the company. Her departure was reported on 29 September and disclosed in an internal memo reviewed by Bloomberg News, according to Bloomberg.

Deadline has reported that Holland's exit cleared the way for Bloys to run the combined streaming operation. But no leadership plan has been announced. Paramount's purchase of Warner Bros. Discovery, the parent company of HBO, had not officially closed when Bloys took the stage.

Paramount has tentatively set Tuesday, 6 October to close the deal, according to regulatory filings cited by Variety. That left Bloys with little he could confirm. Asked whether the two apps — HBO Max and Paramount+, both paid video libraries watched over the internet — would merge into one or be sold together as a bundle, he declined to answer.

He did offer praise for Paramount chief David Ellison. Bloys said Ellison is very excited and very respectful of what the HBO team has done across the entire history of HBO. He added that he believes Ellison will maintain what HBO has done.

Bloys was more direct about the state of television. He said the industry is on the backside of a bursting bubble, down from about 600 shows to about 400. Greenlighting, meaning approving new series for production, on the basis of an idea alone at the height of the market was unsustainable, he said, because the business could not make enough money from that many shows.

Losing about 200 shows hurts people. At an average of a couple of hundred jobs per show, Bloys called the drop-off a catastrophe. Each order that disappears can mean lost work for writers, crews and actors.

For viewers, this means two waits. One is short: who runs the combined streaming business, and whether viewers will face one app, two apps or a discounted bundle. The other is longer. With fewer series ordered across the industry, fewer new stories ever reach the screen.