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I came into this business in 2013, fresh out of college, when the machine still looked expensive, ambitious, and alive. By the time I graduated, Netflix had only just released House of Cards  and was still very much associated with DVD mailers. Film still had room for middle-tier work. Television still behaved like it wanted volume, not just events. Premium cable still mattered. Basic cable still produced hits that lived in the culture. Network still treated long-season telev

On Sunday night, March 15, the Academy Awards will once again unfold inside the Dolby Theatre, with Conan O’Brien hosting and the usual parade of stars, handlers, stylists, sponsors, and self-appointed royalty filing into a 3,400-seat shrine built for televised grandeur. Outside that heavily managed bubble, the surrounding city remains a far uglier and more honest backdrop than the ceremony will ever admit. Hollywood can lock down a 1-mile security perimeter, flood the area w

The message tells the truth faster than the industry does, because volume strips away the flattering exceptions and leaves only the repeating behaviors that investors learn to treat as predictive. A steady stream of financing outreach arrives every week, and much of it reads as though the sender believes the act of asking is the hard part. A few sentences arrive with large numbers attached, a vague reference to progress, a hint of credibility borrowed from someone else’s name

I'm laughing. I've been laughing since January 2025, and January 2026 gave me no reason to stop. February won't either. Next week will bring more nonsense, and I'll be laughing at that too, because the independent entertainment industry keeps asking to be treated like a serious asset class while refusing to behave like one. This is not a think piece about market conditions. This is me, standing outside the room where you're about to pitch, telling you that the people on the o

I had over 7,000 pitches come to me in 2025, and every single one landed on the same assumption that a festival premiere would convert into a major acquisition. After enough repetitions, follow-up questions stopped adding value, since the plan rarely extended beyond finishing the film, submitting to Sundance, SXSW, Cannes, or Tribeca, and waiting for a buyer to appear. Sundance 2026 is now in its final days, with the Park City run concluded, and the full lineup totaled 97 pro

There is a moment happening right now where the film industry is congratulating itself for solving a problem it created, using a solution that changes almost nothing. The announcement that Netflix is offering crew bonuses tied to viewership, supported publicly by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, is being framed as progress. The coverage treats it as a moral correction, a sign that the system is finally taking care of people who were previously ignored.  Many commentators are calli

“First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.” - Epictetus In an era where the constant stream of online opinion amplifies every voice and performative urgency often substitutes for substance, genuine advancement arises through disciplined restraint and the patient cultivation of meaningful connections over time. This foundational approach has propelled Rapp Consulting  from its origins as a niche bridge between creative ambition and financial rea

Awards season opened in 2026 with the same playbook Hollywood used when the market was expanding, even though the underlying business indicators had already moved into a contraction cycle. Watching the early January circuit run at full speed raised a simple question that should not be controversial in “what the f*ck happened to movies and awards?”. The full prestige stack still rolled out on schedule, including private events, televised ceremonies, and campaign-adjacent progr

In 2025, Hollywood’s relentless pursuit of intellectual property reboots reached an undeniable breaking point. Studios flooded theaters and streaming platforms with reimagined classics, prequels, mid-quests, sequels, spinoffs, and hollow adaptations designed to exploit collective memory as a substitute for conviction. What was positioned as a low-risk strategy for box office stability instead backfired, transforming nostalgia from a commercial safety net into a source of audi

James Cameron comes from a time when RISK and REWARD went hand in hand, when the system was not so diluted, and people actually cared about the craft. He took 13 years to make Avatar , the biggest and highest-grossing film of all time, which faded from cultural memory not long after losing the Academy Award for Best Picture. It took another 13 years for the sequel to arrive, and its reception materially weakened the prospects for Avatar: Fire and Ash  while casting doubt on w

The film industry likes to behave as if the problems it faces were unforeseeable. Executives point to macroeconomic volatility, shifting audience behavior, content saturation, and the fragmentation of attention across digital platforms. Creatives point to a cultural decline, political shifts, and supposed audience exhaustion. Analysts point to streaming disruption, shifting window strategies, and global market unpredictability. None of these explanations confront the truth. T

In the intricate realm of entertainment, where aspirations meet financial realities and creative visions grapple with market demands, a damaging misconception persists about consulting. This negative perception is an artificial construct, sustained by emotional comfort rather than factual grounding. By 2025, it has solidified into a default mindset, labeling any outside advisor promoting structure as exploitative, any practicality check as exclusionary, and any budget limit a

“Survive till ’25” was the line repeated across Hollywood for more than a year. Executives treated it as a realistic path forward. Finish the strike recovery. Clear the backlog. Release a stronger slate. Stabilize the streaming sector. Profitability would return once the market corrected itself. What the industry discovered instead is that 2025 was not a recovery year. It was the reckoning. Every deferred cost, every distorted incentive, every sequel-first strategy and budget

In 2025 the independent film business has lost its sense of proportion. The same forces that inflated studio budgets have migrated into the very space that was supposed to be agile and restrained. Above the line spending on talent, especially cast, has reached a level where the economics of many so-called indie films no longer resemble an investment case. They resemble a vanity spend. What used to be a lane for modestly budgeted, high impact work has become congested with pro

The entertainment industry did not collapse in one year…It eroded slowly, hidden behind headlines about solidarity, record deals, and “historic” contracts. The 2023 strikes were supposed to be a line in the sand. They became the blueprint for an industry-wide redesign that dismantled the workforce, decentralized production, and redefined who holds power in a POST-Covid world. 2 years later, the entire global entertainment economy, from Los Angeles to London to Seoul, operates

Ridley Scott has spent the last half-century being called a master of spectacle. He built a career on cinematic precision and visual grandeur that shaped generations of filmmakers. From Alien  to Blade Runner  to Gladiator , he was the rare director whose name carried weight with both audiences and investors. Yet in 2025, the same man who once redefined the standard of excellence is now publicly lamenting that Hollywood is drowning in mediocrity. While he is far from wrong, i

Hollywood’s lights are still on, but the power is fading and 2025 has made that painfully clear. The premieres look the same, the headlines still sound triumphant, and the PR machine hasn’t slowed BUT behind the gloss, the system is imploding. The numbers don’t lie. The creative bankruptcy that’s been festering for a decade has finally matured into financial collapse. This isn’t cyclical, it’s a structural issue. The industry that once defined culture now produces diminishing

For more than a decade, every corner of the entertainment industry has carried the same defensive reflex. When something fails, it’s the...

When The Smashing Machine  opened last weekend to a domestic box office of approximately $6 million against a reported $50 million...

You thought the strikes were about wages and likeness rights? Idiots! Writers, actors, producers, and even the unions themselves all...