Morning Wire: Les Moonves to spend Sumner Redstone's money getting into a business he is already in

When Viacom and CBS split, It was said that Les Moonves believed the Paramount Pictures unit should have fallen under his rule being that he already had the television business and the two just went well together. But unfortunately for him the film business went to the since canned Tom Freston. But that didn't kill Les's dreams of being in the movie business. See Les doesn't mind gambling Sumner Redstone's money getting into new businesses. He re-launched CBS Records which hasn't even registered as a blip on any radar, and now he is about to gamble even bigger by building a movie studio from scratch. To show how serious CBS is about getting into the film business, Moonves already tapped a CEO in former Columbia Pictures production exec Amy Baer. We hope the film unit makes more noise than the record label. In an interview, Mr. Moonves said he had been eager to get back into the movie business, but that he did not view his film unit as replacing Showtime’s supply of movies from Paramount — or from M.G.M. or Lionsgate, whose output deals expire next year. “These four to six movies we’re doing are certainly not going to fill the pipeline,” he said. “I like the idea of owning more and more content, as you see what these libraries are worth, and the possibilities of what we can do with this company,” Mr. Moonves said. Moonves Picks Chief for Film Unit Under CBS [NYT]