Cartoon Villain Hollywood Honcho David Zaslav Is Getting Roasted For Admitting The Writers Were ‘Right About Almost Everything’ In An Interview About The Months-Long Strike

If there was a single villain of the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, it had to be David Zaslav. Before they began in the spring, the Warner Bros. Discovery honcho had already become infamous for creatively bad and/or Bond villain-y decisions. (He even made another right after the last one ended.) Once the industry shut down, it was Zaslav who became even more hissable than Bob Iger and Ted Sarandos. Now the Wile E. Coyote of media oligarchs has found another inventive way to step in it.

As caught by The Hollywood Reporter, The New York Times has a new profile of Zaslav, which is far more diplomatic than the blistering GQ op-ed that was infamously taken down. That doesn’t mean Zaslav doesn’t hang himself with his own rope. Indeed, at one point he discusses the WGA strike, which began in May and became the second-longest labor stoppage by the guild in history. But judging from Zaslav’s comments, it probably didn’t need to last that long…or happen at all.

“They are right about almost everything,” Zaslav brazenly admitted. “So what if we overpay? I’ve never regretted overpaying for great talent or a great asset.”

Did Zaslav always feel that way? Was he the outlier among the AMPTP gang? Is he simply saying that now, in an attempt at revisionist history? Perhaps he was that shaken by getting booed during a commencement speech shortly after the WGA went on strike.

Whatever the case, the comments were galling. Although some found themselves agreeing with Zaslav on one thing.

Some argued that Zaslav’s comments don’t make him look smart.

Others couldn’t believe he appeared to say the quiet part loud.

Others, though, took him to task for all the lives he and others in the AMTPT screwed up by playing hardball.

https://twitter.com/TimSaccardo/status/1724818294765707743

And, of course, there were jokes.

Maybe Zaslav simply needed to distract people after he took heat for trying to bury an already completed movie everyone wants to see and which would have made his company tons of money. Hopefully none of the shareholders are reading the news.

(Via NYT and THR)