As news broke yesterday of more layoffs at Warner Bros. Discovery, another shift was taking place that will mean significant changes at its animation studios.
Kidscreen has confirmed that the Warner Bros. Animation (WBA) and Cartoon Network Studios (CNS) development and production teams will now work together on both studios’ projects, while the Hanna-Barbera Studios Europe operations will remain separate. Audrey Diehl (pictured), previously WBA’s SVP of series—and a former Nickelodeon exec—will head up the new joint kids and family series development team, with Sam Register continuing to serve as president of all three studios.
Teams at WBA and CNS have built cross-studio workflows over the years for current programming, casting and business operations. This restructuring is meant to mirror that set-up for WBA and CNS, hopefully yielding similar efficiencies while keeping production output consistent.
Multiple projects are currently in development and production at CNS, which is focused on original animated projects such as recent series Unicorn: Warriors Eternal. It’s a similar story at WBA, which is concentrating on legacy IPs like Looney Toons.
WBD has undergone several big kids content changes in recent months. Starting with the exit of Tom Ascheim—president of kids, young adults and classics—in May, the media company has been reworking this side of its business to achieve the US$3 billion in savings it projected the merger could deliver. Since then, HBO Max has been shifting away from live-action projects for kids, scrapping big-budget films like Batgirl. And in August, 14% of the streamer’s staff was laid off.