© DAN MACMEDAN, USA TODAY
The premiere of the 27th season of South Park has been kept waiting by Paramount while the parent company seeks to complete a merger with media conglomerate Skydance, owned by Larry Ellison’s son David Ellison.
That wait for the Season 27 premiere of South Park continues but this week it became clear the show will go on after Paramount and Park County, Trey Park and Matt Stone’s production company, agreed to a 5-year streaming deal worth $1.5 billion according to L.A. Times senior entertainment writer Meg James who first broke the news.
Paramount And South Park Agree To $1.5 Billion Streaming Deal
South Park has been one of the most popular adult cartoons for decades. It has been around for nearly 30 years and millennials have spent most of their lives laughing at Trey Parker and Matt Stone’s masterpiece, myself included.
And as a cartoon, the show has just a fraction of the overhead compared to a live TV show or one shot on a studio set with cast members. So it is considerably easier to turn a profit on South Park when compared to sitcoms throughout the industry.
To be certain, South Park is worth every penny of that $1.5 billion streaming deal which will keep the show at Paramount for (at least) the next five years. According to the report from the L.A. Times, the deal “will fetch $1.5 billion for streaming alone.”
That’s a LOT of cash just for streaming rights. This will also bring South Park to the flagship Paramount+ streaming service for the first time in the United States.
Currently, it can only be streamed in the US on HBO Max, Philo, and other streaming services with added premium subscriptions. So this deal will unify it under the Paramount+ streaming service.
Paramount Pays Parker And Stone, Cancels Colbert
But the timing of the deal is notable as Paramount just announced they were canceling Stephen Colbert’s The Late Show. The given reason for the cancellation was Stephen Colbert’s show was losing “tens of millions” per year, according to the NYT.
Many outlets have reported the annual losses at $40 million while others have questioned the math behind that figure.
Colbert’s was the flagship show in late night TV and many around the entertainment industry speculate how the show could be (1) losing that much money, (2) be canceled without cost-cutting changes implemented first, and (3) canceled before the competition with less success than Colbert (Fallon, Kimmel, etc).
In Stephen Colbert’s own words on his show, he addressed the cancellation. Stephen said “over the weekend, somebody at CBS followed up their gracious press release with a gracious anonymous leak, saying they pulled the plug on our show because of losses pegged between $40 million and $50 million a year.”
Stephen Colbert continued, adding “$40 million is a big number. I could see us losing $24 million. But where would Paramount have possibly spent the other $16 million? Oh yeah.”
If Stephen Colbert himself, the head of the show, is not aware of where the $40 million in losses were coming from it seems there was a major breakdown of communication between the show’s runners and the financiers.
It is also worth noting this is an outright cancellation of The Late Show and not a changing of the hosts as we have seen in years past in late night TV. Letterman’s show, Colbert’s show, it will be permanently shut down.
Season 27 Premieres Today
Season 27 of South Park is set to premiered today, July 23rd. Here is a teaser released back in April:
The show was initially set to premiere on July 9th but was delayed due to the ongoing Paramount and Skydance merger that was complicated due to a lawsuit with President Trump that was settled between Trump and Paramount for $16 million, according to the L.A. Times.