David Ellison boasts a cozy relationship with President Trump, a string of right-coded hires and financial allies in the Saudi Arabian government.
He also may be the best hope to save American moviegoing.
It was only a few months ago that Mr. Ellison, the millennial son of the tech billionaire Larry Ellison, spent $8 billion, much of it from his family, to snap up the Paramount media empire, transforming himself almost overnight into a major Hollywood power player. Then on Monday, the younger Mr. Ellison launched a $108.4 billion hostile offer to take over Warner Bros. Discovery, an audacious move given that Warner’s board had already decided to sell much of the company to the Silicon Valley streaming giant Netflix for nearly $83 billion.
