AEW President Tony Khan recently appeared on the Spoticast podcast in an interview covering all things pro wrestling. During the discussion, Khan reiterated what he has said in past about their most important revenue driver being the deal with Warner Brothers Discovery:
“Our TV deals are, I think, the biggest individual revenue driver. For us, we’ve got this great partnership with Warner Brothers Discovery, and we’ve got the rest of this year and next year, and, and they have really been so good to us. I feel like not only was the original leadership so great to take a chance on an unknown company, but then, you know, post merger, the Discovery leadership that’s come in has been so supportive, and we’re getting opportunities now with the new management even bigger than we’ve ever gotten before.”
Khan spoke about what changes there have been with the new Warner Brothers Discovery:
“New leadership, new faces, new people, and they’re great people. We’ve had different management teams over the last few years. This is a new group, and obviously, they have different experiences than the previous management. They have different insights and a different portfolio of IP coming in, but also new IP being created by the new property and existing IP that we’ve never really been associated with before. So just in the few months that we’ve been working together, it’s been great getting to know them and work with them. They’ve given us opportunities for integrations. I hope that we’ve done a good job. I think the fact that we’re getting more of them, and that they’ve been so positive about the job we’ve done, I guess it went really well.”
“You know, Shark Week is the longest running, most successful weekly TV event in the history of cable. It is very important to the people at Discovery. I’ve seen it firsthand, and it makes total sense. They gave us the opportunities to promote Shark Week in AEW and develop creative of our own to help further the promotion of Shark Week. Then based on the success of that, they came right back to us with a huge opportunity. You know, we’ve been working with Warner Media before Warner Brothers Discovery for years and never had opportunities to do integrations with HBO let alone with the number one show on TV right now with House of the Dragon and have the opportunity to promote House of the Dragon and for them to ask me if I can come up with a way to integrate it into our show.”
A recent article published by Deadline discussed the changes that have taken place at Warner Bros. Discovery, and the article seems to paint a positive picture for the future of AEW on TBS and TNT. Deadline wrote, “TNT is now looking for more cost-effective series that don’t go after A-list movie talent and would complement the tentpole sports/unscripted programming on TNT — as well as the rest of Warner Bros. Discovery’s suite of linear networks under Finch. That could include wrestling-themed shows, as AEW is a major draw on TNT, and scripted series that have the feel of some of the signature Discovery docu reality series like The Deadliest Catch. IP-based/genre series also are being explored, we hear.”
You can listen to the complete SpotiCast interview below:
(h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription)
