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Crowds gather outside Buckingham Palace to watch a fly-past by the Red Arrows on the 80th anniversary of VE Day in London, United Kingdom, on May 05, 2025.
HARD NUMBERS: UK celebrates VE Day, Stock volatility boosts European banks, Trump wants Alcatraz reopened, Manhattan hosts Met Gala, Oceania rebuffs Trump’s film-tariff threat
1,300: On Monday, the United Kingdom started celebrating the 80th anniversary of VE Day, which commemorates the Allied victory of World War II, with a slew of street and tea parties across the country. There was also a 1,300-strong military procession along the Mall, the stretch of road connecting Buckingham Palace and Trafalgar Square. One million people flooded the area on the original VE Day, May 8, 1945.
13 billion: Donald Trump’s tariff bonanza induced a huge amount of stock market volatility, and the largest European investment banks are pleased as punch. This week, UBS, BNP Paribas, Société Générale, Barclays, and Deutsche Bank posted their largest quarterly revenues in over a decade, reporting a combined €13 billion ($14.7 billion) from equities and fixed income in the first quarter of the year. The stellar performance mirrors the hefty revenues that their American counterparts gathered in the first three months of 2025.
$60 million: Maybe there’s no escape from Alcatraz: Donald Trump wants to reopen the island prison, which was shut in 1963. “The reopening of ALCATRAZ will serve as a symbol of Law, Order, and JUSTICE,” the president wrote on social media. The prison, which sits just over a mile off the coast in the San Francisco Bay, once housed the notorious mobster Al Capone. It is currently operated by the National Park Service, which hosts 1.6 million visitors a year, generating roughly $60 million in revenue.
$75,000: New York City hosted the Met Gala on Monday night. Individiual tickets sold for a cool $75,000, with the money raised going to the Museum’s Costume Institute. Some have used the gala to spread political messages, like when Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) wore a dress with the message, “Tax the Rich,” to the 2021 iteration.
540 million: The governments of Australia and New Zealand vowed to protect their film industries after US President Donald Trump threatened to impose 100% tariffs on foreign films. The Oceanic pair have become a popular filming spot for Hollywood filmmakers, in part thanks to lower costs and government tax incentives. Australia alone has spent AU$540 million ($349.4 million) since 2019 to attract international film productions.
James Hawes giving evidence on British film and high-end television to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee at the Houses of Parliament, London. Picture date: Wednesday February 21, 2024.
A night at the soap opera
British director James Hawes recently testified to Parliament’s Culture, Media and Sport committee that AI might be able to make realistic soap operas within three to five years. That number comes from Hawes’ own polling of visual effects professionals in the film industry and lawyers advising the Hollywood screenwriters union in its negotiations with major studios this summer.
Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, Hollywood director Tyler Perry has reportedly put his studio expansion on hold citing concerns about AI video generators taking hold and disrupting the filmmaking industry. He said he’s reconsidering a plan to pour $800 million into his Atlanta, Georgia studio after seeing OpenAI’s Sora video generator, which is yet to be released to the public.
Perry said in an interview with the Hollywood Reporter that AI technology might eliminate the need for him to shoot on location, if he’s instead able to simulate scenes convincingly through text generation. Of course, he’s worried about the human toll: “I immediately started thinking of everyone in the industry who would be affected by this, including actors and grip and electric and transportation and sound and editors, and looking at this, I’m thinking this will touch every corner of our industry.”