Media Maneuvers

Harvey Weinstein

The Weinstein Co. has reached an agreement with its unsecured creditors that clears the way for Lantern Capital to acquire the company. TWC declared bankruptcy in March. The unsecured creditors’ committee represents accusers of former TWC head Harvey Weinstein, among others. The agreement will remove the need for further litigation, and ensures the close of the sale. TWC and Lantern said the sale price would be $289 million, down $21 million from the initial $310 million price. The companies had previously considered a $23 million price cut. While the deal was expected to close last month, Lantern reportedly got cold feet, and has since claimed that TWC misled it. The sale is expected to close next week, contingent on its approval at a bankruptcy court hearing scheduled for July 11.

Tariffs are taking a hit at the U.S. newspaper industry. Tariffs being levied on the Canadian paper used to make newsprint are hiking costs for many U.S. newspapers, putting an additional squeeze on an industry that is already hurting. In January, duties of from 4.42 percent to 9.93 percent were levied after the U.S. Commerce Department made a preliminary determination that Canadian paper suppliers had received financial assistance from the country’s government. A Commerce Department finding in June added another 22.16 percent to the price tag of paper from some Canadian paper producers and exporters. The hikes are leading to cutbacks in other areas of some publishers’ business—particularly when it comes to payroll. The Tampa Bay Times has said it is cutting about 50 jobs to compensate for what it says is an additional $3.5 million in expenditures on paper.

Ed Schultz

Ed Schultz, who hosted “The Ed Show” on MSNBC from 2009 to 2015, died on Thursday at his Washington, D.C. home. While Schultz started out hosting a conservative radio show in Fargo, N.D., he announced that he was a Democrat in 2000, subsequently moving his show toward a more left-wing, though staunchly middle-class, point of view. By 2005, he was hosting a liberal-leaning radio show funded by Democracy Radio, a New York nonprofit. At MSNBC he joined a lineup that included such liberal stalwarts as Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann. After MSNBC canceled “The Ed Show,” Schultz joined Russian-government backed news outlet Russia Today, hosting a prime-time program called “News with Ed,” which was still on the RT lineup at the time of his death. Russia Today was forced to register as a foreign agent earlier this year. “We are devastated by the news of the sudden death of our brilliant anchor, one of the best TV journalists in America, Ed Schultz,” RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan said in a statement. Schultz was 64.