Head of Paramount Pictures is ousted as ViacomCBS focuses on streaming.

In 2017, Viacom turned to just one of Hollywood’s most seasoned and revered executives, James N. Gianopulos, to revive its flatlining Paramount Pics operation. Mr. Gianopulos immediately stabilized the 1910s-era studio — fixing interactions with filmmakers and producers, constructing a thriving tv division from close to-scratch, and restoring Paramount to profitability.

He was ousted on Monday, with his standing as the consummate Hollywood insider possessing curdled into a legal responsibility, at minimum to ViacomCBS, the conglomerate that owns Paramount, wherever streaming, streaming, streaming is the new currency of the realm.

Brian Robbins, 58, who runs Viacom’s children’s television company, will succeed Mr. Gianopulos, 69, as chief executive of Paramount Images, ViacomCBS explained. Emma Watts, 51, the president of Paramount’s Motion Photograph Team, was notably handed about for the career.

The reversal of fortune for Mr. Gianopulos, who had two decades remaining on his contract, did not shock the motion picture money, where speculation about his standing inside ViacomCBS experienced been gossiped about for months. Shari Redstone, who controls the company, had signaled in non-public that Mr. Gianopulos experienced turn out to be a disappointment. In particular, he experienced, at instances, resisted a ViacomCBS exertion to prioritize the Paramount+ streaming assistance at the price of ticket profits and theaters. Huge-display releases continue being of very important worth to studio companions like Tom Cruise, who stars in Paramount’s “Mission: Impossible” collection and coming “Top Gun” sequel.

But the ouster rattled the movie small business however. It was found by some as barbarous — tradition retains that senior statesmen get to produce their very own endings. And it included to a modifying of the guard: Ron Meyer, a longtime film energy at Universal, still left previous yr amid a sexual intercourse scandal, and Alan F. Horn, the main artistic officer at Walt Disney Studios, is broadly anticipated to retire in the coming months.

Bob Bakish, the chief government of ViacomCBS, stated in a assertion that the leadership change would “build on Paramount’s robust momentum, making sure it continues to have interaction audiences at scale even though embracing viewers’ evolving preferences and behavior.” He explained Mr. Robbins was an “expert” at acquiring franchises by “leaning into the one of a kind strengths of new and founded platforms.”

Mr. Bakish named Mr. Gianopulos “a towering determine in Hollywood” and thanked him for revitalizing Paramount. In the similar assertion, Mr. Gianopulos recounted a record of significant improvements he experienced effectively navigated around his almost 40-yr occupation — these as the introduction of VCRs and on line movie rentals — and wished Mr. Robbins “all the really very best results.”

For many film marketplace stalwarts, Mr. Robbins is an affront to their identities he will come from television, claimed when keeping one’s nose. Mr. Robbins has working experience as a film producer and director. But substantially of the Hollywood establishment also appears to be like down on that component of his résumé, which includes “Norbit,” a commercially successful but critically reviled Eddie Murphy vehicle from 2007. Not accurately Oscar bait.

Mr. Robbins obtained fame as a young actor in the 1980s by enjoying a mulleted rebel on the ABC sitcom “Head of the Course.” In the 1990s and 2000s he labored as a television producer (“Kenan & Kel” on Nickelodeon, “Smallville” on the WB) and a movie director (“Norbit,” “Varsity Blues”).

By 2009, having said that, Mr. Robbins commenced to come to be disillusioned with Hollywood. Young audiences — his specialty — ended up dwelling on line. He commenced experimenting with minimal-spending budget movies starring YouTube personalities like Lucas Cruikshank (a.k.a. Fred Figgelhorn) and started off a YouTube channel, AwesomenessTV, aimed at teenage girls. In 2013, Jeffrey Katzenberg, who was then functioning DreamWorks Animation, purchased AwesomenessTV for about $33 million. (Mr. Katzenberg remains a mentor.)

“There is no movie business enterprise anymore!” Mr. Robbins was quoted by Quick Business as expressing in 2013. “The model’s broken, and I see that as an option.”

Mr. Robbins was named president of Nickelodeon, which is also owned by ViacomCBS, in 2018. He has come to be recognized within Viacom as a simple-spoken, in no way-say-die futurist who thinks that Paramount+, the company’s relatively compact streaming service, need to be supercharged. Mr. Robbins has eagerly rerouted new children’s programming toward Paramount+ and away from Nickelodeon’s standard cable channels. Just one such clearly show, a reboot of “iCarly,” has been a hit for the streaming services.

Mr. Gianopulos, or “Jim G” as every person in Hollywood refers to him, will continue being a guide till the conclude of the yr, ViacomCBS reported. “Jim is absolutely nothing much less than famous in this organization, and I am humbled and grateful to him for his yrs of mentorship and friendship,” Mr. Robbins said in a assertion.

Mr. Robbins will carry on to lead Nickelodeon, ViacomCBS mentioned. But he will not get all of Mr. Gianopulos’s portfolio Paramount Television Studios will now report to David Nevins, the chairman and main govt of Showtime Networks.