Today’s Big Story

Red Lobster Goes Bust

Don’t just blame the endless shrimp, there’s private equity and a decade of mismanagement, too

I have fond memories of Red Lobster. Perhaps because for a certain breed of Americans, it was the approachable yet elevated meal of any celebration: “This calls for Red Lobster.” But, after months of rumors, and just days after shuttering dozens of locations across the country, Red Lobster officially filed for bankruptcy.

Some analysts say the 56-year-old American seafood chain’s “endless shrimp” promotion was its death blow. Or, at least, heavily responsible for its demise. A successful limited-time promotion for more than two decades, the company made $20 all-you-can-eat shrimp a permanent menu item last summer. According to CNN, once a Thai seafood supplier became its biggest stakeholder, they saw the promotion as a way to sell off the mountains of shrimp it was catching. But the menu change actually cost the company at least $11 million. (Never underestimate the amount of shrimp hungry Americans can put down.)

Of course, while it makes for good social media fodder, you can’t just blame the shrimp. “As to what drove Red Lobster to the edge, it’s clear that despite not being a very good idea, the blame doesn’t fall on Endless Shrimp,” Business Insider’s Emily Stewart argued a few weeks ago. Years of underinvestment in the chain’s marketing, food quality and restaurant upgrades probably had something to do with it, too.

Eater says it’s even more complicated than that. “Red Lobster has had a really rough last 10 years, and since 2021, the chain has had five different CEOs.” And before that CEO shuffle, Red Lobster’s parent company Darden sold the chain to a private equity firm called Golden Gate Capital for $2.1 billion. “And like with other private equity forays into industries like retail and media, Red Lobster’s new private equity owner saddled it with tons of debt.” That the endless shrimp ruined Red Lobster is certainly a novel idea, but “the idea of private equity vultures swooping in to siphon every last drop of value from a beloved institution or brand before it inevitably dies? Well, that’s a tale as old as time.”

Going forward, the company says it plans to focus on retaining employees and streamlining its menu, according to the Chapter 11 filing that was submitted to U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Florida. It’s not yet known how many more locations will close, or what Red Lobster might look like once the reorganization is finished.

Prosecution Rests at Trump’s Criminal Trial

Things got heated as the judge threatened to remove witness from court for behavior on stand

After 15 days of testimony from 20 witnesses, the Manhattan district attorney’s office on Monday rested its case in the first criminal trial of an American president. But on this pivotal day, the courtroom nearly spun out of control. The judge cleared the courtroom of reporters for some time as he threatened to remove the defense’s witness—Robert Costello, a former federal prosecutor—from the trial altogether because of his behavior on the stand.

Costello was a former legal adviser to Cohen, who after three days of grinding cross-examination, finally stepped off the stand, leaving jurors to weigh his truthfulness. Costello is also the defense’s only real witness. But his testimony quickly grew tense after he was scolded by Judge Merchan for muttering and rolling his eyes during his rulings. Leaving court for the day, Trump praised Costello and called the judge a “tyrant” and the trial a “disaster.”

The trial was clipping along last week, and it seemed possible that the jury would be deliberating before Memorial Day. Those plans were dashed on Monday when Justice Merchan announced that closing arguments would be delayed until after the holiday weekend. The defense is expected to rest today, barring a last-minute surprise, and that could mean an extended break for jurors.

Weight Loss Drugs Get a Glow-Up

Hims & Hers says it will offer Wegovy-like GLP-1 drugs for affordable prices

The millennial-skewed telehealth platform Hims & Hers announced Monday that is now offering customers a compounded version of semaglutide, the active ingredient in popular weight loss drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy.

According to Gizmodo, customers will be able to get a prescription for the drug from a licensed health care provider directly on the platform. A month’s supply of the weight loss medication will start at $199—which is hundreds of dollars cheaper than Ozempic’s nearly $1,000 list price and Wegovy’s $1,349 price tag.

Axios reports that nearly all of the booming weight-loss drugs like Wegovy have been in short supply, with companies scrambling to ramp up production. Hims & Hers can offer the so-called compounded version of the drugs due to their appearance on the FDA's drug shortages list, Bloomberg noted. When supplies stabilize, “Hims & Hers plans to make branded options available to customers,” the company said.

Scarlett Johansson Says OpenAI Ripped Off Her Voice

And she might be right, because ChatGPT’s ‘Her’-like voice is now gone

Seems like that chatter about the movie Her wasn’t all that far off. Scarlett Johansson says that OpenAI acutally asked her to be the voice behind ChatGPT—but that when she declined, the company went ahead and created a voice that sounded just like her. In a statement shared to NPR, Johansson says that she has now been “forced to hire legal counsel” and has sent two letters to OpenAI inquiring how the soundalike ChatGPT voice, known as Sky, was made.

“Last September, I received an offer from Sam Altman, who wanted to hire me to voice the current ChatGPT 4.0 system,” Johansson says. She added that Altman contacted her agent as recently as two days before the company first demoed the ChatGPT voice asking for her to reconsider. After the accusation raised questions, OpenAI posted to social media that they are now “working to pause the use of Sky while we address them.”

In a blog post further explaining the situation, the company said that “Sky’s voice is not an imitation of Scarlett Johansson but belongs to a different professional actress using her own natural speaking voice.”  WIRED says that Altman has made it clear that he admires Johansson’s work. He’s said that Her is his favorite film. And given that Altman tweeted solely the word “Her” on May 13, that does not seem super-feasible, but hey, whatever you say, guys.

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