Amazon said Monday it will distribute its original films and TV shows, like "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel," to media outlets outside its Prime Video service for the first time.
The works will be licensed via a new unit called Amazon MGM Studios Distribution, which expands the number of titles currently offered by Hollywood studio MGM. Last year, the e-commerce-behemoth-turned-media-giant closed its acquisition of MGM — which houses more than 4,000 film titles and 17,000 TV episodes — for $8.5 billion.
At launch, the new division will offer several series and films including "Coming 2 America" and "Borat Subsequent Moviefilm," Amazon said. The unit will be led by Chris Ottinger, the head of distribution at MGM, who will continue to oversee distribution of MGM's new releases and film franchises, such as the James Bond and Rocky series.
"With the integration of MGM, we wanted to take advantage of the existing team to expand our business in ways that will greatly benefit our customers around the world," Jen Salke, who heads up Amazon and MGM Studios, said in a prepared statement.
Last week, Amazon said it would add more than 100 Amazon Originals to i ts free, ad-supported streaming service Freevee.
Harvey Weinstein hit with new sex crime charge in New York
Harvey Weinstein pleaded not guilty Wednesday to a new sex crime charge in New York, as he awaits retrial in his landmark #MeToo case.
Details of the new allegations were not immediately available. He was charged with committing a criminal sex act.
The jailed ex-movie mogul has long maintained that any sexual activity was consensual.
Prosecutors revealed last week that Weinstein had been indicted on additional sex crime charges that weren't part of the case that led to his now-overturned 2020 conviction. But the new indictment was sealed until his arraignment.
Prosecutors have said that the grand jury heard evidence of up to three alleged assaults — two in hotels in the Tribeca neighborhood and one at a lower Manhattan residential building. The purported incidents took place from the mid-2000s to 2016, prosecutors said.
But it's not clear whether any of those allegations underlie the new indictment.
While bracing for the new charges, Weinstein also is awaiting retrial after New York state's highest court this spring overturned his 2020 conviction on rape and sexual assault charges involving two women. The high court, called the Court of Appeals, ordered a new trial, which is tentatively scheduled to begin Nov. 12.
The Court of Appeals ruled that the then-trial judge unfairly allowed testimony against him based on allegations that were not part of the case. That judge's term expired in 2022, and he is no longer on the bench.
Prosecutors have said they'll seek to fold the new charges into the retrial, but Weinstein's lawyers say it should be a separate case.
Weinstein, who also was convicted in 2022 in a Los Angeles rape case, remains behind bars while awaiting his New York retrial.
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