| President Donald Trump announced a plan to increase film and TV production in the US: He’s going to impose a 100% tariff on movies produced overseas. So far, the plan announced on Truth Social is short on details. For example, it’s not clear if he plans to tax movies that are shot overseas and finished in the US. That covers a lot of current Hollywood output. It’s also not clear if he plans to tax TV shows made overseas for international audiences but available in the US (aka much of Netflix’s catalog). Studios are producing more projects in countries such as Canada, New Zealand and the UK because it’s cheaper to do so. Many countries offer lucrative incentives and more favorable labor conditions. The cost of producing in the US spiked recently after domestic labor unions negotiated better terms for their members. The soaring cost of production is also why many shoots have left Los Angeles for markets like Georgia and New Mexico. Many producers and executives would like to shoot more in the US — and California specifically — but only if costs come down. Trump’s statement doesn’t address costs as there is no mention of domestic incentives. Jon Voight and his manager Stephen Paul have been pushing Trump to offer federal incentives for production. These incentives would be on top of existing state incentives and could be bought and sold. Voight, Paul and Paul’s deputy Scott Karol spent the weekend at the Mar-a-Lago Club with Trump. In between watching the Kentucky Derby, they outlined their plans for these incentives. Perhaps inspired by these conversations, Trump posted his thoughts Sunday — but focused on tariffs, one of his favorite tactics. The risk of any tariffs on foreign production is that they increase the likelihood that other countries retaliate. While a lot of physical production has moved abroad, the US entertainment industry has a positive trade balance with every market in the world, according to the Motion Picture Association. The business exports more than three times as much as it imports, the trade group says. No foreign-language film ranked among the 50 highest-grossing movies in the US last year. The 10 highest-grossing movies in the world last year were all released by US studios. In other words, Hollywood makes a lot of money exporting its product all over the world. Movies make the majority of their money from international sales, while streaming services like Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon produce shows for global audiences in dozens of markets (including the US). This is a cornerstone of Netflix’s entire strategy. While China has already curbed the number of foreign movies it will import as a result of Trump’s trade policies, the country has also recently approved the release of several Hollywood features, including a new How to Train Your Dragon, suggesting the pullback is modest. Will Beijing increase its restrictions even more now? Will Europe tax US movies or streaming services? We don’t know the answer to any of this just yet. Maybe Voight does. In January the president appointed him, Mel Gibson and Sylvester Stallone to be special ambassadors for Hollywood and find ways to help the film and TV industry. Five things you need to know - A US judge said Apple violated a court order and handed Fortnite developer Epic Games a huge victory in its dispute with the iPhone maker over its payment policy. Spotify has already taken advantage of the ruling, which will let companies direct consumers to buy their services outside of the App Store (and skip Apple’s 30% fee).
- Joe Rogan has been the most popular podcast in the US for more than five years. Can anyone beat him? Ashley Carman looks at the data.
- Take-Two delayed the release of Grand Theft Auto VI and Wall Street freaked out.
- There will soon be only one Democrat left at the FCC. Anna Gomez spoke to Kelcee Griffis about President Donald Trump, who signed an executive order last week seeking to end federal funding for NPR and PBS.
- 60 Minutes is about to air yet another story about Trump. We wrote about why Paramount chair Shari Redstone has soured on the leading newsmagazine.
| 
