Paramount Global Pauses Major MTV, CMT, Nickelodeon Awards Ahead of Skydance Merger

New York, NY — Paramount Global is implementing a significant temporary halt on several of its major awards shows scheduled for 2025, a move directly linked to the media giant’s impending corporate merger. The decision, first reported by The Hollywood Reporter, underscores the operational shifts underway as Paramount prepares for integration.

Understanding the Impact on Key Events

The pause affects a slate of prominent events spanning different brands and regions. Among the shows being temporarily suspended are the MTV Europe Music Awards (EMAs), a major international event recognizing global music artists and cultural trends; the CMT Music Awards, a long-standing celebration of country music’s biggest stars; the MTV Latin America’s MIAW Awards, which honors the best in pop culture, digital trends, and music popular with youth audiences across Latin America; and Nickelodeon’s Kids’ Choice Awards in Mexico, an important regional version of the globally recognized children’s awards franchise where winners are chosen by kids.

These events collectively represent significant annual platforms for artists, content creators, and advertisers across diverse genres and geographies. Their temporary absence from the 2025 calendar signals a strategic reprioritization and consolidation effort within the company as it navigates a complex corporate transaction and plans for a streamlined future structure.

The Corporate Context: Paramount Global’s Strategic Shift

The catalyst for this widespread pause is Paramount Global’s anticipated merger with Skydance Media. This significant corporate transaction, involving complex negotiations and regulatory reviews, is expected to be finalized in the first half of 2025. Major mergers of this scale typically trigger extensive strategic reviews of all business units, including evaluating the return on investment, operational efficiency, and strategic fit of large-scale annual events.

The decision to pause these specific awards shows appears to be a direct consequence of this broader process of preparing the company for a new era under combined ownership. The goal is likely to ensure a smoother integration and to allow the combined entity’s leadership to determine the optimal strategy for its events portfolio moving forward, aligning it with the overall business objectives and resource allocation.

Events Still Scheduled

Crucially, not all major tentpole events within the Paramount Global portfolio are affected by this strategic pause. The company has confirmed that other key shows, notably MTV’s Video Music Awards (VMAs), one of the most globally recognized and watched music awards ceremonies, and Nickelodeon’s Kids’ Choice Awards in the United States, the flagship domestic version of the popular children’s awards, are still scheduled to proceed as planned.

This distinction suggests that these particular events either hold unique strategic importance, operate under different financial models, or have contractual obligations that make them less susceptible to the temporary operational adjustments required by the merger process. The continuation of the VMAs, in particular, indicates Paramount’s commitment to preserving its most high-profile global music franchise even amidst significant corporate transition.

Executive Rationale and Future Outlook

The decision to pause these events was formally communicated internally to staff by Bruce Gillmer, a key executive within Paramount Global overseeing music and events. In a staff memo obtained by reports, Gillmer provided insight into the company’s thinking.

He stated that the move is not merely a cancellation but an opportunity, allowing the company to “reimagine and optimize our events slate going forward.” This language strongly suggests that the temporary suspension is intended to provide a dedicated period for a comprehensive strategic evaluation of the formats, production methods, scheduling, and overall value proposition of these events. The outcome of this “reimagining” process, which will likely involve assessing resource allocation and market relevance, will ultimately determine the future shape and timing of Paramount Global’s non-U.S. and genre-specific awards calendar in 2026 and beyond, depending on the strategic priorities of the combined Paramount-Skydance entity.

A Look at the History

The affected awards shows include events with considerable history and established cultural footprints within their respective niches. The CMT Music Awards, for instance, is one of Paramount Global’s longest-running awards franchises, tracing its origins back remarkably to 1967. This history underscores its deep roots within the country music landscape and its significance to fans and artists over decades.

Similarly, the MTV EMAs debuted in 1994 and quickly grew into a major annual event, hosted in different European cities each year, showcasing international music talent and reaching a vast global audience. The temporary halting of events with such established legacies and production complexities points to the scale and potential disruption associated with a major corporate integration process like the one Paramount Global is undertaking.

Implications for the Industry

The temporary removal of these platforms from the 2025 calendar will inevitably have ripple effects across the music and entertainment industries, particularly in the affected genres and regions. Artists, their management teams, and record labels will lose key promotional opportunities and recognition platforms for the year. For emerging artists, these shows often provide crucial visibility.

Production companies, technical vendors, broadcast partners, and host venues typically involved in staging these large-scale international events will also face operational and financial impacts. While the pause is framed as temporary and strategic, it introduces a degree of uncertainty for the future formats and timing of these long-running franchises. The successful resolution of the Paramount-Skydance merger and the subsequent strategic decisions by the new leadership will be key factors determining the shape of Paramount Global’s international and genre-specific events calendar in 2026 and beyond, potentially influencing how similar events are approached across the media landscape.

The pause serves as a tangible example of how major corporate mergers can directly influence operational strategies, potentially affecting even high-profile, long-running annual events that fans and industry professionals anticipate, as companies focus on integration and future planning.