Scouting Hollywood Feb. 16-22

A roundup of news, gossip and history of the entertainment business brought to you from Hollywood, Calif.

After seven weeks atop the chart, Avatar: The Way of Water was finally pushed aside by two new entrants, M. Night Shyamalan’s Knock At The Cabin Door from Universal, and Paramount’s well-timed Super Bowl granny comedy 80 For Brady. Avatar has raked in over $636 million just in North America.

If you are sharing a Netflix account, be prepared for some changes as the streamer rolls out its plan to cut down on password sharing. According to an FAQ, that was later taken down from their website, primary account holders will be able to share account access with members of the same household only, and can add “outside users” for an additional $3 per month. Every time an outside user attempts to log in, the primary account holder will receive a 4-digit verification code that the outside user must enter to gain access. When a user travels, access will be allowed from a laptop, tablet or other mobile device as long as it has connected to the user’s home network (WiFi) at some point in the prior 31 days. This goes in effect for U.S. subscribers sometime in March or April.  The suits are hoping their new push into advertising on some subscription levels will make up for the loss of accounts. If Netflix is successful, you can bet this will be instituted at all the other streaming services.