The Mail Cart: Monday, October 19th

👋 THANK YOU to everyone who came out to our first AvA LIVE: IRL in LA last night.

The biggest takeaway from nearly every panelist: You will not get far unless you’re willing to take big swings and be a little delusional.

Highlight of the night was going through Jason Blum’s very AvA-coded texts with his Assistants. NYC next? Should we announce the 2nd Annual Award Show in LA?? Other cities???

The resale ticketing industry IS as bad as you think btw (we have receipts)…

New York Knicks and Philadelphia 76ers break the record for most expensive NBA regular season game of all time (the season hasn’t even started yet), Universal Music & Sony formally request how many AI songs have been released on DistroKid to help in their lawsuit against Suno, The Golden State Valkyries reach $1 billion in value just 3 years after being formed for $50 million, Verve signs a 10-year lease to stay in Hollywood, and BET is the latest company to join the ~~dying~~ ~~thriving~~ (?) late night talk show industry.

AvA Job Board

💼 Looking for open Entertainment jobs? Today we highlight jobs from Disney, Betches Media, CAA & Sony Music. Scroll to the bottom of this email, or visit our Job Board, which now has 225+ early career Entertainment roles.

Follow our IG page for daily resources, standout jobs (staff picks vibe), and niche industry facts to impress your boss.

🎵 The Department of Justice filed a $120 million lawsuit against San Diego based ticket re-selling company REPS & Co.

The company purchased 18.6 million tickets across 83,500 shows, so in short, you are not crazy for thinking the concert experience is insane and flawed at the moment.

💿 The New York Knicks and Philadelphia 76ers officially is the most expensive regular season NBA game in the league’s history.

Average tickets cost $1,840, with the lowest price being $1,112. I suppose that’s what happens when you win a championship and play in what may be LeBron’s last first game of the season ever.

🏑 Disney is teaming up with Dude Perfect on a sweeping deal covering streaming, merch, live experiences and original videos built around Disney IP.

The five-man Texas crew will make content around Super Bowl LXI, Star Wars’ 50th anniversary and Avengers: Doomsday, and Disney gets a cut of DP’s existing short-form library for Disney+, ESPN and its socials.

The deal lands weeks after CEO Andrew Yaffe stepped down, and it reads like an answer to the scale question. Dude Perfect was the creator economy’s poster child for going big, with $100M from Highmount, an NBA exec in the c-suit, and the next Disney of YouTube ambitions.

Now it looks more like a channel plugging into a platform. Their core business may not scale like it was initially pitched, but rather community/craft so this deal makes a lot of sense

🎬 Universal Music and Sony filed a request to DistroKid to figure out how many AI-generated tracks the platform releases to help with their lawsuit against Suno.

Am I the only one who almost doesn’t want to know how much AI-slop is hitting streaming services anymore?

⚖ Verve signed a new 10-year lease to keep their headquarters in Hollywood.

As the only major talent agency headquartered in Hollywood, we’re proud to deepen our commitment to the Hollywood Media District.

— Adam Levine & Bryan Besser, Verve Co-Founding Partners

💿 BET announced a new late night talk show hosted by Nick Cannon… and this meme sums up the late night industry perfectly:

💡Coolest thing I saw this week: Mad Realities is expanding one of my fav social series, Shop Cats to Celebrity Cats, where they will travel around the country and visit celebrities and…their cats

Our guest this week on AvA LIVE needs no introduction…

He's (let’s scrap all this PR fluff) Hollywood's most feared agent. A few years ago I was an assistant at WME and had what I would call the most frightening experience of my life besides hosting AVA LIVE: IRL last night.

Ari sent a meme I made to the entire company and asked “who did this?” You know the end of the story, but we’ll break it all down this week on AvA Live at 12:30 PM PT.

Plus Matt Damon’s Stunt Double in The Odyssey! Kristen from The Hollywood Hang! and Saul who is about to share the craziest Assistant story I’ve ever heard.