Last year was good to Jeff Shell. This year, not so much.

The short-lived Paramount Skydance president received a total pay package of $60.7 million in 2025. In 2026, he was ousted amid a fight with a high-stakes gambler.

The only one to out-earn Shell over the four-ish months of the year that Skydance actually controlled Paramount was the combined company’s CEO, David Ellison, who was awarded a $63 million pay package. No wonder he can guarantee the Warner Bros. Discovery bid. (Kidding, the accepted bid is backstopped primarily by his wealthy dad, Oracle founder Larry Ellison.)

Ellison received a base salary of $1.4 million, alongside stock awards of $58.7 million. He also received an additional $1.4 million in compensation, which included an annual incentive award, as well as services provided to Skydance and Paramount Global prior to the Closing Date. Skydance Media completed its $8.4 billion acquisition of Paramount Global on August 7, 2025.

Over the majority of 2025, George Cheeks (president and CEO of CBS), Brian Robbins (president and CEO of Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon), and Chris McCarthy (president and CEO, Showtime & MTV Entertainment Studios) shared the “Office of the CEO.”

The year prior, the old trio tallied $61 million in total compensation. Cheeks’ piece of the pie was $22.1 million, Robbins’ was $19.6 million, and McCarthy got $19.5 million.

Their 2024 compensation packages included their earnings before they were elevated to the co-CEO roles, and the discrepancies between them reflect the differences in the divisions of the company that each oversees. The year-old filing indicated that their compensation specific to their work in the office of the CEO was $6 million each.

More to come.