The Guy Who Trey Parker and Matt Stone Nearly Sued Is Now Running Paramount
Just a few months ago, Trey Parker and Matt Stone hired a high-powered entertainment lawyer in apparent preparation for a possible legal battle against Paramount Global, Skydance Media and RedBird Capital executive Jeff Shell. Today, Shell is the guy who signs their South Park checks.
The recent and highly politicized acquisition of Paramount by Skydance had such a straining effect on Paramount’s relationship with its most lucrative creative talents that, up until the moment Parker and Stone signed a contract extension with Paramount worth $1.5 billion in late July, it looked like the South Park creators were about to hit the media mega-corporation with a lawsuit that would make President Donald Trump’s bogus 60 Minutes complaint look like a small claims squabble. When initial streaming negotiations between Paramount and South Park stalled out, Parker and Stone’s lawyers accused Paramount, Skydance and Shell specifically of illegally interfering in their talks with other streamers and conspiring to lower the pair’s asking price for the highly sought-after South Park streaming rights, and, to many insiders, the dispute seemed to be destined for the courtroom.
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Today, however, the Paramount/Skydance merger is complete, South Park is locked in a five-year extension with their old partners, and Shell is settling into his new role as Paramount president. A legal showdown has been safely avoided by all concerned parties – but, considering how South Park has been treating both Paramount and the actual President as of late, none of this means that any of them are safe from Parker and Stone’s wrath.
When Paramount and Skydance were still waiting on approval from Trump's FCC on their multi-billion-dollar merger, rumors from industry insiders claimed that the incoming executives were unconvinced that South Park was worth its hefty price tag. With the end of South Park's streaming deal with Paramount on the horizon, the current Paramount brass simply weren't willing to offer Parker and Stone the reported 10-year, $3 billion extension that the creators desired.
However, when Parker and Stone began to shop around the desirable South Park rights to other streaming platforms, the pair's lawyers sent Shell a strongly worded letter accusing the potential new Paramount regime – Shell specifically – of going behind Parker and Stone's backs and approaching both Netflix and Warner Bros. Discovery about weakening their bids for South Park's business in order to drive down the asking price.
Since Paramount is the co-owner of the South Park streaming rights with Parker and Stone through their joint venture South Park Digital Studios, Skydance responded to these accusations by claiming that they were entitled to approve, deny or, apparently, significantly alter any contract concerning the South Park streaming rights. Parker and Stone plainly disagreed, and the pair hired one of Hollywood's most notorious pit bull litigators, Bryan Freedman, in preparation for a proper dog fight.
But just when war seemed inevitable, Parker, Stone and Paramount returned to the negotiating table, and all the parties settled on a mutually beneficial compromise, inking a 5-year, $1.5 billion streaming deal to keep South Park in the Paramount family. Soon thereafter, Trump's FCC approved the Paramount/Skydance merger, and Shell assumed his current position as the president of Paramount. South Park celebrated the many successful deals with the Season 27 premiere “Sermon on the 'Mount,” which ruthlessly roasted both Paramount and Trump while breaking streaming records.
Clearly, the conditions of South Park's extension with Paramount do not restrict Parker and Stone from publicly lambasting their parent company, so the acrimony between South Park and the new Paramount head could very well continue onscreen rather than in court. Then again, with how the rest of Season 27 has been going, Parker and Stone simply may simply be too preoccupied with other recent developments in the world to keep making fun of their new boss – after all, did you know that today is Butters' birthday?
