Will Spielberg, Geffen Walk From Dreamworks?

Peter Bart reports in today's L.A. editions of Variety that Viacom chief Sumner Redstone's relationship with Steven Spielberg and David Geffen is going south.

According to his report-which relies on unnamed sources-the duo could walk in 15 months if their relationship with Mr. Redstone, whose purchase of Dreamworks through Paramount was regarded as Read More

Family Feudal: Redstone, 84, Losing Heir at Viacom

Sumner Redstone "played down" reports over the last 24 hours that he had becomed estranged from his daughter and once-presumptive heir, Shari Redstone.

But the effect of his words was to confirms suspicions, as Richard Siklos and Geraldine Fabrikant write in The New York Times today, that the 84-year-old Mr. Redstone is preparing a William Randolph Hearst-style Read More

MTV to Skateboarders: Break a Leg, Live!

On the evening of May 31, 2006, a shaggy-haired teenager in Buffalo, N.Y., peddled his skateboard toward a flight of concrete steps and launched into the air. A few seconds later, Mason Jukes lay at the foot of the stairs, screaming. His fibula and tibia had shattered on the pavement upon landing. Nearby, a second Read More

The Battle of Dante’s Cove

If you’ve lately gotten on the subway at the intersection of 14th Street and Eighth Avenue, you’ve probably seen the ads plastered across the subway tile for the television show Dante’s Cove.

The ads, featuring two bare-chested men looking a little lasciviously into the eyes of passing commuters, promote a television show that’s a bit Read More

Hudson Square Grabs Viacom; Penn Plaza Nabs Gym Chain

Media behemoth Viacom has a lease out for as much as 250,000 square feet at 345 Hudson Street, in the long-struggling commercial area of Soho’s Hudson Square.

Viacom, which counts MTV and Paramount Pictures among its many assets, is closing in on between 200,000 and 250,000 square feet, said Jason Pizer, the director of Read More

Hudson Square–Separating Hype From Reality

For years, Hudson Square has been an echo chamber of rumors. The vacancy rate is amazingly high, but brokers–especially those at Cushman & Wakefield brought in by Trinity Real Estate to shake things up–promise that will change.

In Wednesday’s Times, Andy Peretz of C&W said, “We have so many deals and so many leases out, Read More

In This Week’s [em]Observer[/em]…

Hudson Square Grabs Viacom Lease
“Media behemoth Viacom has a lease out for as much as 250,000 square feet at 345 Hudson Street in the long-struggling commercial area of Soho’s Hudson Square.”
New York Sports Club Parent Leases in Penn Plaza
“Take that, Equinox! Town Sports, which controls omnipresent gym New York Read More

All I Want This Christmas: An Exit Strategy!

And so we’ve come to the final days of 2005.

The tips have been distributed; the holiday cards have been dispatched. And all that’s left is that flurry of last-minute shopping for the most difficult gifts—the gifts for whom it’s not just “the thought” that counts.

So what, then, is the perfect gift Read More

All I Want This Christmas: An Exit Strategy!

And so we’ve come to the final days of 2005.

The tips have been distributed; the holiday cards have been dispatched. And all that’s left is that flurry of last-minute shopping for the most difficult gifts—the gifts for whom it’s not just “the thought” that counts.

So what, then, is the perfect gift this year? Read More