Latest news with #HouseOfDavid
The Verge
9 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Verge
Runway is going to let people generate video games with AI
So far, Runway is known for bringing generative AI to Hollywood. Now, the $3 billion startup is setting its sights on the gaming industry. This week, I was granted access to a new interactive gaming experience that Runway plans to make available to everyone as soon as next week, according to CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela. The consumer-facing product is currently quite barebones, with a chat interface that supports only text and image generation, but Valenzuela says that generated video games are coming later this year. He says that Runway is also in talks with gaming companies about both using its technology and accessing their datasets for training. Based on his recent conversations, Valenzuela believes the gaming industry is in a similar position to Hollywood when it was first introduced to generative AI. There was considerable resistance, but over time, AI has been gradually adopted in more areas of the production process. Valenzuela says Amazon's recent show, House of David, was made in part with Runway's technology, and that his company is working with 'pretty much every major studio' and 'most of the Fortune 100 companies.' 'If we can help a studio make a movie 40 percent faster, then we're probably gonna be able to help developers of games make games faster,' he says. 'They're waking up, and they're moving faster than I would say the studios were moving two years ago.' Naturally, I couldn't let Valenzuela get off our Zoom call without asking him about his recent acquisition talks with Zuckerberg: 'I think we have more interesting intellectual challenges being independent, and remaining independent for now.' This story was first published in Command Line.
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
House of David Season 2 Will Cost You an Extra $9 to Watch on Prime Video This Fall — Here's Why
If you want to see Season 2 of House of David this fall, you'll have to cough up an additional nine bucks. The faith-based drama will initially be exclusive to Wonder Project subscribers — a new subscription offering exclusively available through Amazon. That means, in addition to your Prime Video subscription, you'll have to pay for Wonder Project, which will cost $8.99/month at launch. More from TVLine TVLine's Performer of the Week: Jonathan Roumie House of David Renewed for Season 2 at Amazon Netflix's Building the Band, Featuring the Late Liam Payne, Is The Voice Meets Love Is Blind - Watch Trailer The subscription-within-a-subscription promises 'over 1,000 hours of highly curated movies and TV series that reflect the company's mission: to entertain the world with courageous stories, inspiring hope and restoring faith in things worth believing in' — but if you don't want all of that, don't worry: exclusivity will eventually lapse, and House of David Season 2 will be available to all Prime Video subscribers at a later date. House of David 'tells the story of the ascent of the biblical figure, David (played by Michael Iskander), who eventually becomes the most renowned and celebrated king of Israel,' according the official logline. 'The series follows the once-mighty King Saul as he falls victim to his own pride. At the direction of God, the prophet Samuel anoints an unlikely, outcast teenager as the new king. As Saul loses his power over his kingdom, David finds himself on a journey to discover and fulfill his destiny, navigating love, loss, and violence in the court of the very man he's destined to replace. As one leader falls, another must rise.' Season 2, meanwhile, 'will follow the aftermath of the battle between David and Goliath and David's rise to the throne. As he navigates palace politics, his family's jealousy, and a growing romance, David steps deeper into his destiny and learns what it means to become a great leader.' House of David was renewed for a second season on March 18, two weeks out from the biblical epic's Season 1 finale, which dropped on Thursday, April 3. The Feb. 27 premiere had reportedly garnered 22 million viewers in its first 17 days of release (though Amazon has not defined how it measures a 'viewer'). 'Jon Erwin and Jon Gunn's compelling creative vision has solidified our belief in the series and we are excited to deliver more of the story to our customers,' Amazon MGM Studios head of television Vernon Sanders said in a statement at the time. 'We look forward to a continued journey with Wonder Project as we further expand our slate to encompass faith-based series.' Added Erwin and Gunn: 'We are humbled by the extraordinary reaction this show has earned from the faith audience worldwide. Thanks to them and our partners at Prime Video and Amazon MGM Studios, Wonder Project will bring more of the Bible and this epic saga to a global audience. Congratulations to our incredible cast and crew.' Will you pay more to binge-watch Season 2 this fall? Or will you be holding out for its eventual wide release? Drop your thoughts in a comment below. An A-to-Z List of 300+ Scripted Series View List Best of TVLine 'Missing' Shows, Found! Get the Latest on Ahsoka, Monarch, P-Valley, Sugar, Anansi Boys and 25+ Others Yellowjackets Mysteries: An Up-to-Date List of the Series' Biggest Questions (and Answers?) The Emmys' Most Memorable Moments: Laughter, Tears, Historical Wins, 'The Big One' and More
Telegraph
05-06-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
The Trump foe behind Amazon's Biblical epic
Leonard Leo won his decades-long crusade to reshape the US legal system when he helped Donald Trump appoint three conservative Supreme Court justices, securing a Right-leaning supermajority in the nation's highest court. While he has since fallen out of favour with the president who last week branded him a 'sleazebag', the Federalist Society leader has quietly been fighting another battle: giving pop culture a Godly makeover. 'I just said to myself well if this can work for law, why can't it work for lots of other areas of American culture and American life where things are really messed up right now,' Mr Leo said in a promotional video for Teneo, a conservative networking hub he helped fund. He went on: 'Entertainment that's really corrupting our youth – why can't we build talent pipelines and networks that can positively affect those areas as well?' So far, the Christian power player's campaign to litter the streaming charts with conservative programming is another success story. Mr Leo, 59, secretly helped bankroll the studio behind House of David, a biblical retelling of David and Goliath, according to the Wall Street Journal. Like the story of its protagonist, it defied the odds by leaping to the coveted number one spot on Amazon Prime. It has already been commissioned for a second season. Mr Leo, who joined the Federalist Society as a student in the 1980s, reportedly has not spoken to Mr Trump in five years, but as his scope for influencing the president dwindled, he began yielding another power playing tool. In 2020 Barre Seid, the Chicago billionaire, donated all of his shares in his electrical manufacturing firm Tripp Lite to one of Mr Leo's conservative non-profits. It was then sold for $1.6 billion. This funding allowed him to plough millions of dollars into amplifying religious and conservative filmmakers, the newspaper reported. Mr Leo is said to have helped fund Wonder Project, a Texas-based studio founded by Jon Erwin, the Christian director, which created House of David. The studio's tagline is: 'Restoring faith in things worth believing in.' In an Instagram post announcing it had achieved number one on the Amazon Prime chart, Wonder Project said 'all glory to God for this one'. Mr Erwin is a member of Teneo which has a subgroup focused on entertainment. Its annual conference is understood to have become a nerve centre for Christian filmmakers where creatives pitch to conservative investors. The network is understood to invest in studios rather than individual movies to achieve an ongoing impact on culture, rather than producing one-hit wonders. Wonder Project has received funding from Sovereign Capital, a Christian investment firm. John Coleman, its leader, said its objective is 'to love God and love our neighbour through investing'. Mr Leo has also reportedly given money into Sycamore Studios, which focuses on children's entertainment free of views of diversity, gender or homosexuality. 'We're not going to be the Ford Foundation to be around forever,' Mr Leo told the Wall Street Journal. 'The goal is to do our work, and at some point in time to decide that we've done what we can do and move on.' The success of House of David, which more than 22 million people streamed in the first two weeks, comes amid a surge in appetite for Christian films – one of which Mr Erwin has helped spearhead. He was the mastermind behind Jesus Revolution, a 2023 film which is based on the true story of the early days of the 'Jesus People' hippie subculture in the 1960s. It left out that the protagonist, Lonnie Frisbee, who really did kickstart the Jesus movement, was gay and died of Aids in 1993, after he was excommunicated and outcast from the movement he had founded. It made more than $50 million at the box office and when it was released it was the highest-grossing film released by the Lionsgate studio since 2019. It was the 48th highest grossing film in the US in 2023. Mr Erwin's previous works include October Baby, about young mothers finding God in an abortion clinic, and Woodland, which features young mothers finding God on an equalities march. 'Within the entertainment industry specifically, I think there's an uprising on the behalf of Christianity,' Mr Erwin previously told Christianity Today. 'I think there's a resurgence in belief and a sudden increase in spirituality in America, even though church attendance is going down. It's an exciting moment to be in the business. We're at the forefront of a return to God.' He added: 'We've only scratched the surface on what faith-based entertainment can be. We're wondering, 'How can we make the Bible a cinematic universe?'' Key players continue to make inroads. In April, Angel Studios released King of Kings, an animated film in which Charles Dickens, voiced by Kenneth Brannagh, tells the story of Jesus to his son Walter, played by Roman Griffin Davis. The film made over $60 million at the box office and is number 11 of the highest grossing films so far this year in the US, according to IMDB. Angel Studios also helped launch Biblical drama The Chosen, a series about Jesus's life. When the fifth season was released this year, they put out a three-part cinematic release. All three are in the top 50 highest-grossing box office releases so far this year, bringing in more than $43 million collectively. Mr Erwin's next directing project with Angel Studios, is Young Washington, a film about the origins of America's first president. Trump attacks Leo When it comes to the origins of Mr Trump's initial electoral success, Mr Leo was certainly a player. During the 2016 election campaign he gave Mr Trump a list of potential justices he could appoint to win over support from the Republican base. He advised Mr Trump on the nominations of Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett. But last week, Mr Trump, who reportedly believes Mr Leo took too much credit for the judicial appointments, went from simply banishing Mr Leo to his close confidantes to publicly attacking him. 'I was new to Washington, and it was suggested that I use The Federalist Society as a recommending source on judges,' Mr Trump wrote on Truth Social after a US court blocked the majority of his tariffs. 'I did so, openly and freely, but then realised that they were under the thumb of a real 'sleazebag' named Leonard Leo, a bad person who, in his own way, probably hates America, and obviously has his own separate ambitions.' Responding to the jibe, Mr Leo praised Mr Trump 'transforming' the federal courts, which he said amounted to Mr Trump's 'most important legacy'. As Mr Leo moves on from Maga and begins to flex his soft power in the entertainment industry, it is clear Mr Trump was just one episode in his multi-part series on his own crusade to reshape America in his conservative, Christian vision.
Wall Street Journal
04-06-2025
- Business
- Wall Street Journal
This Conservative Is Doing Just Fine, Thank You, After Getting Dumped by Trump
'House of David,' a retelling of the biblical shepherd's unlikely rise, capped season one with the future king's epic takedown of Goliath and started April in Amazon's top streaming spot. David's surprise triumph was also Leonard Leo's. The conservative lawyer and co-chairman of the Federalist Society has been secretly helping bankroll Wonder Project, a Texas-based studio that produced the popular series and, Leo hopes, will follow with a string of Christian- and conservative-leaning shows so slick they can go head-to-head with other big-budget entertainment.
