Mark Ruffalo Calls on State AGs to Stop Paramount-WBD Merger

In 2023, actor Mark Ruffalo and anti-monopoly policy analyst Matt Stoller met on a Zoom call during the Writers Guild strike. They bonded over a mutual understanding that the root of all the issues the Guild faced at that time was Hollywood’s continuing consolidation into bigger and bigger corporate giants, agreeing that these companies could get away with cost-cutting measures that would leave the industry worse off. In a new op-ed in the New York Times, Ruffalo and Stoller note that while the prospect of the Paramount–Warner Bros. Discovery merger is frightening, there is still time for those in the industry and in government to act. The pair call on state attorneys general to do “what President Trump’s antitrust enforcers likely will not” and block the merger “on antitrust grounds.”

To his comrades in the film and television industry, Ruffalo encourages ongoing acts of solidarity, such as the open letter from last month. To explicate how and why the merger could be so bad, the pair say that having more studios leads to more competition, which leads to creating riskier projects, like Ruffalo’s HBO miniseries I Know This Much Is True and Best Picture winner Spotlight. “Competition and opportunities for brave storytelling are intrinsically related, and we both knew that having lots of competitive outlets to produce art and lots of paths to distribute it helps to ensure that riskier, more controversial films and TV shows keep getting made,” they write. Ruffalo and Stoller go on to say that, even though they know many people in Hollywood don’t support the merger but are afraid to speak out, the “growing coalition” will cause the tide to turn, not just in entertainment but perhaps on an even larger scale.