HBO and HBO Max overlapping may have sparked the recent shakeup

Vulture

New WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar recently pushed out HBO Max chief Kevin Reilly as well as Reilly’s boss, WarnerMedia direct to consumer chairman Bob Greenblatt, while expanding the duties of HBO programming president Casey Bloys to cover HBO Max. According to Josef Adalian, the reason for the shakeup might have been having too many cooks in the kitchen. "Plenty of projects put into development by the Max Originals team felt like they were going after the same prestige vibe for which HBO is known (like the Lupita Nyong’o limited series Americanah or the Lena Dunham–produced dramedy Generation)," says Adalian. "There were reports that agents weren’t always sure whether to pitch to HBO or Max, and even though Reilly had told me the Max and HBO teams sometimes heard pitches together, that fact alone underscores why Kilar was right to shake things up. If the goal is to have HBO and Max act in concert, you don’t need two teams operating independently."