Upfront week has lastly wrapped, and it’s clear the Writers Guild of America strike had a major impression on virtually each presentation.
Although the star energy was barely dimmer this 12 months, with each Warner Bros. Discovery and Netflix solely that includes executives throughout occasions as many celebrities kept away from crossing picket strains, the week nonetheless had a number of highlights, together with a un-bear-ably foul-mouthed Ted making poignant barbs for NBCUniversal and 100 Samurai slashing via sword-fighting choreography on the North Javits Middle for Disney. Plus, GOATs had been going rogue for Fox.
See all essentially the most memorable upfront week moments under. And if you happen to missed any of our complete upfront week protection, yow will discover it right here.
NBCUniversal
With NBCUniversal kicking off upfront week occasions at Radio Metropolis Music Corridor, WGA protesters made a degree of showing exterior the venue and chanting that there’d be “no pages with out wages.” The strike was additionally felt inside Radio Metropolis, with NBCU closely counting on its information group to current segments throughout the occasion. Nevertheless, NBCU was nonetheless capable of get issues began with a pre-taped video that includes Seth MacFarlane’s potty-mouthed bear, Ted, singing about advertisements and joking: “Twitter could appear to be the place to start/however Twitter simply let all of the crazies again in.” With longtime advert gross sales president Linda Yaccarino exiting the corporate for Twitter days earlier than the occasion, the joke took on an entire new which means. (Although, Mark Marshall, interim chairman of promoting and partnerships, assured Adweek the Twitter quip had been within the presentation for months, and Yaccarino was nicely conscious of it.) — Invoice Bradley
Telemundo
Beau Ferrari, chairman of NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, beforehand instructed Adweek that the corporate’s upfront week theme was “Come With Us,” however we’re right here to announce it actually felt extra like “Come Dance With Us.” From Nicky Jam performing his hits at The Glasshouse in New York to a dance group hyping up the gang whereas the corporate introduced sizzle reels, there’s no dancing round it: the 2023 Telemundo Celebration was the definition of a celebration. – B.B.
