Coronavirus Continues to Impact Hollywood
Recently, the upcoming Beijing premiere of the latest James Bond movie No Time to Die was cancelled due to the uncertainty caused by the coronavirus outbreak. And this is only the beginning of how the virus may impact Hollywood this year. According to Italian media, the filming of Mission: Impossible 7 in Venice was suspended because of the spread of the virus in Italy. Back in early February, The Hollywood Reporter predicted that the estimated loss of global box office as a result of the virus is around 1 billion USD. But if we predict again today, it looks like the loss will be far more than 1 billion. In addition to box office loss, the spreading of the virus on a global scale will likely affect the productions of many new movies this year. Chinese entertainment companies as well as Hollywood firms with close ties with China, such as IMAX and Disney, may take a strong hit. Read more on Ent-Biz
Alibaba Releases Report on “Cloud Living” in China During COVID-19 Outbreak
On Feb. 24, Alibaba announced a report about “cloud life” during the extended Chinese New Year holiday, which listed the most popular online films, drama series, variety shows and other entertainment content based on demographics and content form. Mahua FunAge’s produced Almost a Comedy topped the charts of netizens’ favorite movies, followed by Ip Man 4, Adoring, Ne Zha, and Snake 2. The most popular drama series was Season 12 of Love Stories in the Countryside, a long-lived popular show about rural life in China. As for variety shows, CCTV’s Spring Festival Gala and two comedy shows, Chinese folk art group Deyunshe’s Xiangsheng (“crosstalk”) performance and Joyful Comedians: Season 6. Medical-themed shows, films, and online books surged in popularity. Short video has already become a major way of entertainment for Chinese people, according to data from UC Browser, a subsidiary company also owned by Alibaba. In addition to entertainment content consumption, the report also covers online activities such as “cloud dining”, cloud work out”, cloud travel”, and” cloud clubbing”. Read more on TechWeb
