\n\tHeartbreak does not feel good in a place like this.<\/p>\n
\n\tIn the wake of the startling news of Netflix<\/a>\u2018s proposed acquisition of Warner Bros<\/a>. Discovery (and Paramount<\/a>\u2018s hostile counter bid), Jane Fonda<\/a> took to satire to convey her antitrust concerns. Spoofing Nicole Kidman<\/a>\u2018s zeitgeisty AMC<\/a> Theatres ad, the activist and actress warned of corporate greed and worsening cinematic offerings.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cWe come to this place for mergers,\u201d Fonda began, mirroring Kidman\u2019s words and entry into a theater. \u201cWe stream to self-silence, to censor, to slop. Where content is chosen by the best billionaires we have.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tInstead of relishing in \u201cdazzling images on a huge silver screen,\u201d the Grace and Frankie star faked awe at \u201cdazzling focus-grouped, pre-digested content that lets your brain not do too much thinky-thinky.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cSomehow corporate greed feels good in a place like this,\u201d she continued, watching movies play out on her phone instead of the big screen. \u201cSomehow mergers feel good in a place like this.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIn the parody, which was produced with famed SNL feeder The Groundlings, Fonda is then interrupted by an interloper who tells her: \u201cMa\u2019am, excuse me, ma\u2019am. What are you doing? You gotta go. We\u2019re about to knock this whole place down in five minutes to make a data center, so let\u2019s go. Come on.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tVoicing her criticisms in the caption, the two-time Oscar winner added, \u201cRegardless of which company ends up acquiring Warner Bros. Discovery or its parts, the resulting impact is clear: Consolidation at this scale would be catastrophic for an industry built on free expression, for the creative workers who power it, and for consumers who depend on a free, independent media ecosystem to understand the world. It will mean fewer jobs, fewer creative risks, fewer news sources and far less diversity in the stories Americans get to hear. Consolidation is even scarier in the Trump era because the administration is comfortable using its merger review power to extract political concessions that put our Freedom of Speech at risk.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tLast week, Fonda expressed similar sentiments<\/a> via her newly revived\u00a0Committee for the First Amendment<\/a>, noting the group \u2014 originally launched by her father to combat McCarthyism \u2014 is \u201cready to mobilize\u201d against the deal.<\/p>\n \n\tOn Dec. 5, Netflix announced it would be buying WBD and its streaming assets in a deal worth $82.7 billion<\/a>, a valuation of nearly $28 a share.\u00a0Shortly thereafter, Paramount revealed its hostile bid<\/a>, a cash offer of $30 per share. President Donald Trump has thus far declined to take sides<\/a> in the drama, which will unfold over the next weeks and ultimately require regulatory approval. Following the whiplash news, entertainment industry leaders<\/a> and political officials have sounded off about competition laws, with Elizabeth Warren calling the impending merger<\/a> \u201ca five-alarm antitrust fire\u00a0and exactly what our anti-monopoly laws are written to prevent.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Heartbreak does not feel good in a place like this. In the wake of the startling news of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191052,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[3283,321,93,61,60,21744,1868,96963,5479,3282,2031],"class_list":{"0":"post-191051","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-amc","9":"tag-celebrities","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-jane-fonda","14":"tag-netflix","15":"tag-netflix-wb","16":"tag-nicole-kidman","17":"tag-paramount","18":"tag-warner-bros"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191051"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191051\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191052"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}