Global Entertainment This Week: Awards, Box Office Magic and Big Music Moves

Lainey Wilson’s big CMA Awards sweep, Now You See Me: Now You Don’t topping the box office, Spotify’s WhoSampled acquisition, Backstreet Boys tour hints, Lorde’s 2026 festival slot and fresh streaming shake-ups define this week in entertainment.

Suzan Seherin November 21, 2025 3 minutes read

From Nashville’s biggest country night to Hollywood’s latest box-office battle and a major streaming shake-up, entertainment news has been busy this week. Music stars, studios and tech platforms are all trying to hold audience attention as the year winds down.

Awards spotlight: CMA Awards crown Lainey Wilson

Country music’s focus was firmly on Nashville, where the 59th Annual CMA Awards delivered a career-defining night for Lainey Wilson. She hosted the show and won Entertainer of the Year for the second time, joining Barbara Mandrell and Taylor Swift as the only women to repeat in that category.

Wilson also took Album of the Year for Whirlwind and Female Vocalist of the Year, confirming her status as the genre’s leading star. Ella Langley and Riley Green had a huge night with their duet You Look Like You Love Me, which swept major single, song and video categories, while Vince Gill received the Willie Nelson Lifetime Achievement Award.

Box office: ‘Now You See Me’ tops charts as ‘Wicked’ hype builds

At the cinema, Now You See Me: Now You Don’t opened at number one in North America with about $21.3 million, while delivering a much stronger global debut of roughly $78 million. The third heist-magic film is tracking below earlier entries domestically; however, it is performing well overseas and could still join 2025’s top-earning titles if word of mouth holds.

Previous champion Predator: Badlands slid around 68 percent in its second weekend after setting a franchise-record $40 million opening earlier this month. Even with that drop, it has already taken in about $139 million worldwide against a reported $105 million budget, helped by strong international interest. Meanwhile, preview tracking suggests Wicked: For Good could cast a record $200-million-plus global opening spell when it arrives, potentially setting a new mark for a Broadway musical adaptation.

Music tech: Spotify buys WhoSampled and expands credits

In digital music, Spotify announced the acquisition of sample-tracking platform WhoSampled. The company will power a new feature called SongDNA, which helps listeners see how tracks are connected through samples, covers and remixes, while WhoSampled continues as a standalone brand.

Spotify also pledged to expand its song-credits section to list more behind-the-scenes contributors, not only headline artists, writers and producers. Supporters say this extra transparency could bring long-overdue recognition to session players and smaller collaborators; however, the timing has sparked debate, as some artists are already boycotting the platform over its CEO’s investments in an AI-driven defence firm.

Tours and festivals: Backstreet Boys buzz and Lorde’s big London date

Tour news kept pop fans busy as Nick Carter hinted that the Backstreet Boys are preparing another major run after their successful Las Vegas Sphere residency. He suggested the next version of the show would be “pretty new,” fuelling speculation about a 2026 or late-2025 world tour and fresh production ideas built on the band’s long-running nostalgia appeal.

Meanwhile, festival organisers in London confirmed that Lorde will headline All Points East in 2026 at Victoria Park, alongside acts such as PinkPantheress and Zara Larsson. Tickets went on sale this week and demand is already high, reflecting Lorde’s continued global draw and the growing strength of late-summer city festivals in Europe.

Streaming and TV: more cancellations, more premieres

On the small screen, viewers are still navigating an unstable streaming landscape. New round-ups from Rotten Tomatoes and TV Guide show a steady wave of cancellations across networks and platforms, balanced by renewals for big franchise hits and a fresh slate of November premieres.

Netflix has axed a cluster of shows this year while recommitting to some of its biggest properties, part of a strategy to cut costs and focus on global “event” series. As a result, audiences face a constant churn of titles, but also a growing calendar of new genre projects and returning favourites on Netflix, Disney+, Max and other services.

Together, these stories show an entertainment world where live shows, box-office gambles, streaming strategies and music-tech experiments are all competing for the same limited audience attention.

Feature Image: Getty Images