The Promotion (The Studio)

"The Promotion" is the series premiere of the American satirical comedy television series The Studio. The episode was written by series creators Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg, Peter Huyck, Alex Gregory and Frida Perez, and directed by Rogen and Goldberg. It was released on Apple TV+ on March 26, 2025.

The series follows Matt Remick, the newly appointed head of the film production company Continental Studios. He attempts to save the floundering company in an industry undergoing rapid social and economic changes. The episode follows Matt's first day as studio head, as he struggles to assemble a Kool-Aid movie.

The episode received highly positive reviews from critics, who praised its humor, technical values, and performances (particularly Martin Scorsese's guest appearance).

While visiting the set of a film directed by Peter Berg and starring Paul Dano, Continental Studios executive Matt Remick (Seth Rogen) tries to suggest a few ideas, all of which are brushed off by Berg. While Matt believes that films can have artistic integrity, he grows frustrated with the amount of IP-focused films greenlit.

Returning to the studio, his friend and co-worker Sal Saperstein (Ike Barinholtz) informs him that the studio head Patty Leigh (Catherine O'Hara) has been fired after a string of box office failures. He subsequently meets with the new CEO Griffin Mill (Bryan Cranston), who confirms Patty's firing and offers the new position to Matt. While Matt accepts, Griffin still has his reservations about Matt's artistic-focused approach to films, as he wants him to focus on making profitable movies. He has recently obtained the film rights to Kool-Aid and wants Matt to greenlight the film, which he reluctantly accepts.

At his first meeting, Matt tells his workers his plans to make an auteur-driven Kool-Aid movie, inspired by the success of Barbie. Matt and Sal meet with Mitch Weitz (David Krumholtz), a Hollywood agent, to get a director for the movie. Matt is disappointed that only Nicholas Stoller is interested, while other auteur directors are out of the table. After hearing Stoller's pitch, Sal likes his idea while Matt reluctantly goes with it before having a meeting with Martin Scorsese. Scorsese wants to make a film about the Jonestown massacre, but the studios are worried about its long-term prospects due to its massive $200 million budget. Remembering that the event is associated with "Drinking the Kool-Aid", Matt greenlights the film with a bigger budget, telling Scorsese that he simply needs to title it Kool-Aid, which he accepts.

The announcement prompts applause for Matt, but head of marketing Maya Mason (Kathryn Hahn) is shocked when she finds that Jonestown is actually the focus of the film and that Scorsese is eyeing Steve Buscemi to play Jim Jones. When Griffin asks about the film, Matt is forced to bring up Stoller's pitch, and Griffin is enthused. However, he has also learned about the Jonestown pitch and scolds Matt for greenlighting it, refusing to let it be associated with their Kool-Aid movie. Matt saves his position by claiming that he bought Scorsese's script to kill his project; by buying it, they will become the owners of the script, but will never shop it or make it. In an attempt to get Stoller back, Matt tells Mitch that Patty will be a producer on the Kool-Aid movie. Matt visits Patty, who agrees after bargaining a lucrative deal to produce her own movies; when Matt expresses fear that he is ruining film as an art form, Patty reassures him that he will do fine since he had the best teacher around.

Matt and Sal attend a party hosted by Charlize Theron, where they meet with Scorsese. They inform him that the film is cancelled, with Scorsese deducing that the script cannot be shopped anywhere else. This causes Scorsese to cry, and Theron kicks them out of the party. On their way out they bump into Steve Buscemi himself, who tells them it was to be Scorsese's last movie. They go to Matt's house, where they watch Goodfellas.

The episode was written by series creators Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg, Peter Huyck, Alex Gregory and Frida Perez, and directed by Rogen and Goldberg.^[1]

The episode includes a guest appearance by Martin Scorsese, playing himself.^[2] According to Seth Rogen, the cameos "had to all be people that served a very specific role in the stories." He said that when choosing Scorsese as guest star, he was looking for a director whom Matt would idolize and who would also make a film based on Jonestown, with Scorsese being the first name he considered.^[3] Evan Goldberg said that Scorsese accepted the offer after reading the script, "[he] said he was in. We never met the man. It was a miracle."^[4] Describing his appearance, Scorsese said, "It's so good it's painful; it's so truthful that it's painful."^[5] Executive producer James Weaver also mentioned that Scorsese's appearance helped open the doors for more guests in the series.^[6]

When Scorsese arrived on set, Rogen and Goldberg did not inform him that the series would consist of multiple oners in the episode. Rogen considered doing this as a very challenging experience, "Not only were we putting ourselves in a position where we had to direct Scorsese, but also we're shooting him in a very specific way, which is one of the hardest ways to perform." Fearing Scorsese would not like it, they hired a second camera crew.^[3]

"The Promotion" received highly positive reviews from critics. Brian Tallerico of The A.V. Club gave the premiere an "A–" grade and wrote, "There have been a number of behind-the-scenes comedies lately about how hard it is to make movies, but they too often mistake shallow references for actually writing jokes and characters. Luckily, that's not the case with The Studio. The truth is that none of these insider comedies have been as smart or as purely hysterical as this new Apple TV+ series."^[7]

Keith Phipps of Vulture gave the episode a 4 star rating out of 5 and wrote, "This first episode gets The Studio off to a promising start, throwing out sharp satirical points but letting Rogen's performance as Matt keep everything grounded in his sincere desire to be the kind of studio boss he dreamed of being."^[8]

Ben Sherlock of Screen Rant wrote, "The first episode's script does everything a good pilot should: it establishes who all the characters are, what their relationships are, and the world they inhabit, and has a ton of fun doing it."^[9] Nicole Gallucci of Decider wrote, "From start to finish, The Studio's first episode and its specific cameos are smart. But the show wouldn't have sold viewers nearly as hard, as fast without Scorsese's delightful acting, humor, and willingness to go all out."^[10]

• "The Promotion" at IMDb