The Hollywood Reporter to Go Weekly

Storied trade to go “large-format” glossy in October

 

The Hollywood Reporter is going weekly.

In a move that's been widely speculated, Richard Beckman, CEO of THR parent e5 Global Media, announced to the New York Times that, beginning in October, the daily publication will become a glossy, “large-format” weekly magazine.

A daily digital version — in PDF form — will be published for current print subscribers, the paper said.

THR’s current circulation of 47,000 will be increased to 60,000, Beckman said, and the newsstand price will jump from $2.99 per issue to $5.99. The annual subscription rate will drop to $249 from its current $300.

Beckman did not immediately return a request for comment.

The frequency switch comes three months after Beckman hired former Us Weekly editor-in-chief Janice Min as editorial director.

Min has moved quickly to change the tone and culture of the Reporter (“Janice Min's Hollywood Reporter: A Bitchy Switch”) and subsequently alienated some high-powered Hollywood agents in the process.

“We’re not going to be a product that purely strokes the industry because the industry won’t respect that,” Beckman told the Times, adding that he is hoping to target new advertisers — beauty, fashion, consumer electronics and liquor — with the new format. THR’s annual revenue has fallen to about $30 million.

Last month, observers were shocked by a lead story that felt like a broadside against the generally liked Jennifer Aniston:

“’Switch’ a Bitch for Jennifer Aniston” read the headline, above a story that criticized the movie’s underperformance, but then backtracked to say it “wasn’t necessarily a setback” to her career.

That came on the heels of a scandalous — and little substantiated — story about ABC chief Steve McPherson's alleged incidents of sexual harassment on the job, and threats by debt-encumbered financier David Bergstein, who was angered by the coverage of his situation and has also promised to sue.

Much of this is jarring to an industry accustomed to a softer, friendlier (though not widely read) trade paper.

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