A studio merger is settled in boardrooms, but it becomes real when the executives who greenlit the movies learn they will not be the ones releasing them. At Warner Bros, that moment has arrived for Michael De Luca and Pamela Abdy, the motion picture chiefs who took the studio from a record year to a punishing one.

As Deadline reported, the duo’s last day coincides with the first day of Skydance, the name David Ellison has given the combined Paramount-Warner Bros company. Ellison, its co-CEO, has chosen to keep Paramount Pictures co-chairs Dana Goldberg and Josh Greenstein in charge not only of the Melrose lot but of every Warner Bros theatrical brand. That structure cannot coexist with De Luca and Abdy’s contract, which still has years to run and has them reporting directly to the CEO, with marketing and distribution reporting to them.

Warner’s domestic box office from January 1 to October 1 stands at $448.4 million, against the $4.3 billion milestone the pair posted last year on a run that included A Minecraft Movie, Sinners and Weapons. This weekend adds Digger, a Tom Cruise vehicle with a reported budget of $125 million to more than $160 million that is heading for a domestic opening of around $10 million, the star’s lowest in 19 years. The same executives also delivered 11 Oscar wins to the studio this year.

According to Deadline, De Luca and Abdy were blindsided, learning of their fate from Thursday night’s reports without a call from Ellison, who met them on Friday to confirm it. They had expected to keep steering edits, filmmaker relations, marketing and distribution for the 39 dated films they are delivering into a merged company that will count 70 releases from this weekend into 2029.

For now, they plan to rest and recalibrate. They have no competing offers and intend to stay together at the head of a theatrically driven studio. Rumors placing them at Netflix or Sony are, by Deadline’s account, unfounded: Netflix film chairman Dan Lin is staying put, and Sony’s Tom Rothman, 71, has 17 months left on his contract with president Sanford Panitch already in place. The likelier route is a company of their own. “Do you know how much tech money is out there right now?” one source told Deadline. A rumored venture with former Paramount Pictures CEO Brian Robbins stalled because their contract barred them from raising money if WBD merged; Robbins launched Big Shot Pictures instead.

Their final day is Tuesday, Skydance’s first, and their contract, which ran through 2030, must be paid out. The slate they leave behind includes Legendary’s Dune: Part Three, which Deadline pegs as a potential $1 billion year-end tentpole, and a 2027 lineup with A Minecraft Movie Squared, Bradley Cooper’s Ocean’s prequel with Cooper and Margot Robbie, The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum and Godzilla x Kong: Supernova.

Goldberg and Greenstein inherit the billion-dollar Dune bet; De Luca and Abdy’s last weekend in charge belongs to Digger.

Tags: Baker Mayfield, Tom Cruise, David Ellison, Paramount, Margot Robbie, Bradley Cooper, executive-move, Skydance, Warner Bros, Michael De Luca