authentic

One of the hottest tickets for the events surrounding Super Bowl LX in February was a party thrown at the Cow Palace in San Francisco by Sports Illustrated, where attendees could hang with Justin Bieber, Kevin Hart and Travis Kelce.

The magazine’s logo and a team of models from its latest annual swimsuit issue were present at another pre-game bash at the Michelin three-star restaurant Quince.

Sports Illustrated journalists were getting requests from peers looking to score invites to the gatherings, which symbolized a turnaround at the 72-year-old title. Just two years earlier, many of its writers were told their jobs were being eliminated.

But Authentic Brands Group, the New York-based company that purchased Sports Illustrated in 2019 for $110 million, says the title is now thriving after reducing its reliance on advertising and circulation revenue. The privately held firm — which expects $38 billion in global retail sales this year, up from $35 billion in 2025 — does not break out the finances for its businesses but says SI is highly profitable after a rocky period. Less than half of SI’s revenue comes from its media business.

“It took us a little while and we had a couple of bumps along the way,” Daniel W. Dienst, executive vice chairman for Authentic, said in a recent interview from his New York office, where a photo of baseball legend Hank Aaron taken by acclaimed SI photographer Neil Leifer hangs on the wall behind his desk.

For decades, SI was where every sports journalist aspired to work, hoping to become the next Frank DeFord or Gary Smith, whose 32-year career at the magazine is highly revered. Cover images of Muhammad Ali, Michael Jordan and other superstars are emblazoned in the memories of fans who eagerly awaited the title to arrive in the mail each week. For athletes and sports institutions, the cover remains a coveted honor.

“You go to LeBron James’ office in Akron, it’s got his 30 covers on the walls,” Dienst said. “You go to USC, they’ve got 21 covers with their athletes and coaches all over their athletic department.”

Now a monthly magazine, the flagship business of Sports Illustrated is no longer the first stop for fans looking for game analysis or profiles of athletes, many of whom have asserted greater control over their images through social media and podcasts.

Like other print magazines, SI has seen a sharp falloff in its circulation, currently at 400,000, down from 3 million in 2010. Authentic says SI has 52 million users a month on its web site and 21 million social media followers. ESPN had 229 million digital users in November.

But the famous SI name still resonates with generations of consumers and Authentic has sought ways to capitalize on it, from selling replica covers to opening branded resort hotels in Chicago and Nashville. International editions of the magazine have been launched in Germany, China and Mexico, with plans to launch in France and the U.K.

In January, Sports Illustrated launched its own free ad-supported streaming TV channel called SITV that features live shows with its journalists and includes films and shows from an archive stocked with documentaries and swimsuit issue specials going back decades.

The channel, which along with the other SI assets is managed by New York-based Minute Media, will also carry live sports coverage including college basketball. While Minute Media did not reveal early viewership figures, the company said the audience for the channel has grown 60% since its launch.

Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow on the cover of Sports Illustrated.

(Clay Patrick McBride)

The streaming channel is a major media initiative for brand that has seen more activity in other sectors.

In 2023, Authentic put the SI name on Lunatix, a sputtering ticket marketplace. Now called Sports Illustrated Tickets, the business has signage deals with 13 venues around the world including a New Jersey-based stadium — the home of the New York Red Bulls soccer team. The service expects to generate $500 million in revenue this year.

Authentic also uses Sports Illustrated-sponsored events such as the ones held at the Super Bowl to entertain clients for its other businesses and makes tickets available to the public. SI will host an event for Authentic at the Masters golf tournament in Augusta this week and has a permanent high-end, track-side hospitality space at Churchill Downs in Kentucky called Club SI.

Authentic specializes in acquiring and investing in famous retail properties that have foundered. The firm has acquired such names as the outerwear retailer Eddie Bauer, Brooks Brothers and Reebok, and in January took a 51% share in the fashion brand Guess.

ABG enlists outside operators to run the brands. Those operators pay an ongoing license fee to ABG, which also takes a cut of the revenues.

That was the plan when Authentic bought Sports Illustrated from Meredith Corp., now known as People Inc.

After the purchase, Authentic entered a $15-million-a-year licensing agreement with Arena Group (at the time known as Maven) to run Sports Illustrated. A New York-based digital media company, Arena operated such well-known titles as Men’s Journal, Parade and TheStreet. But the partnership unraveled when Arena used AI for sponsored content on Sports Illustrated’s website, which sounded alarm bells at the esteemed publication.

Sports Illustrated’s 2026 Super Bowl party at the Cow Palace in San Francisco.

(Sports Illustrated)

The Arena Group acknowledged it hired an outside firm to create product reviews that used fake bylines. The scandal coincided with the termination of its chief executive, Ross Levinsohn, who once held a leadership role at the Los Angeles Times.

The relationship with Authentic worsened when Arena’s majority owner, Manoj Bhargava, took over as interim chief executive. The founder of 5-Hour Energy, Bhargava tried to fire Sports Illustrated’s unionized editorial staff and renegotiate a lower licensing fee from Authentic. He also used the magazine’s editorial pages and website to promote his energy drink business.

The SI media business was unprofitable under Bhargava and Arena missed a payment to Authentic on its licensing deal. In March 2024, Arena announced it was shutting down the print edition of SI.

Around the same time, Authentic hired Minute Media, which runs the digital sites Fansided and Players’ Tribune, to take over Sports Illustrated. Bhargava didn’t go quietly; according to legal filings, he threatened to delete Sports Illustrated’s archive of intellectual property.

Authentic sued Arena for breaching the SI licensing agreement, which was settled. Many of the title’s laid-off journalists were rehired.

The experience with Arena was a harsh lesson for Authentic, which never had owned a media property before.

“The minute I make that phone call or anybody perceives that Authentic could control the newsroom, forget it, game over,” Dienst said, referencing Bhargava. “We had to move on.”

Minute Media has gotten high marks from the SI staff for its repair work on the media side of the business.

“It’s been a long time since we felt like we had an operator and support from the very top to not just grow what we’re doing day to day, but to grow what Sports Illustrated is going to look like 10 years down the road,” said Steve Cannella, editor in chief of Sports Illustrated.

SI’s union representing editorial employees praised Minute Media when it took over, and is close to agreeing on a new contract deal with the company.

Minute Media is aiming to expand the SI brand‘s reach across other media platforms to make up for the time lost under previous regimes.

“I’ve asked, ‘guys, what are all the things you wanted to do that you haven’t been able to do?’ ” said Minute Media President Rich Routman. “If we’re not trying new stuff, we’re failing.”

Some sports media types believe SI is largely a nostalgia play in a landscape where young fans go elsewhere for game highlights and turn to provocative hosts such as Pat McAfee on YouTube. But awareness goes beyond the audience of baby boomers and Gen Xers who grew up with the brand.

Lisa Delpy Neirotti, who leads the sports management program at George Washington University, recently conducted a study with her students on their media consumption habits. She said she was surprised to see high recognition of Sports Illustrated with the Gen Z crowd, and credits SI for Kids, the spin-off publication for younger readers launched in 1989.

“They would remember getting it in the mail, and it was the first thing that got them interested in sports,” Neirotti said. “There are a lot of positive memories that keep the brand alive.”

Dienst said the audience for SI has gotten younger under Authentic’s ownership. But he doesn’t disregard the oldsters who grew up with it.

“They’re very affluent and they’re super loyal,” he said.

Kountry Wayne likens the dream he’s currently living to an old sitcom that has made the world laugh for decades. “I feel like I’m the new version of ‘Beverly Hillbillies,’” he says. “I’m in Hollywood — I’m here, but I’m still not here, so I just think that’s the most country thing about me.” To his point, the comedian born DeWayne Colley has definitely hit the big time after getting his start in comedy in 2014 (trying his skills as a rapper before that) by working on his stage craft and cooking up Southern-fried viral skits inspired by his small-town Georgia roots. Fast-forward 12 years and his growing empire includes independent movies (including his upcoming film “That’s Her,” which he financed himself), a flood of both dramatic and comedy-driven short skits featuring a wide range of actors, a debut Netflix special (2023’s “A Woman’s Prayer”) and now his latest hour, “Nostalgia,” premiering Monday on Prime Video.

By spending a new hour looking back at a bygone period, specifically the ’90s, when Wayne grew up, the 38-year-old comedian is bringing a fresh approach to the Def Comedy Jam era that he hopes resonates with comedy fans of his generation and younger fans who found him through TikTok and had no idea he even did stand-up. As someone whose comedy career has skyrocketed over the last several years, Wayne’s sights continue to be set toward future opportunities to bring relatable humor to the masses who have that country cousin who walks, talks and jokes just like him.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What does the word “Nostalgia” mean to you?

A good feeling. It means bringing people together through laughter like the good old shows back in the day — “Saved by the Bell,” “Family Matters.” It just is that feeling, whatever that feeling was that we couldn’t put in a jar, I wanted to bring that in my special to just make everybody laugh and forget about the stuff that’s always gonna be here — bills and drama and violence. Just take a break, have fun, and take the breaks we used to take when we used to watch those TV shows in the ’90s.

By the shows you mentioned, I know we’re about the same age. We grew up with the same TV sitcoms and yet still valued being outside, which feels like a foreign concept today.

Yeah, it’s that feeling of all those movies. Man, “Clueless,” when I see that movie, to this day, I still got crushes on all [those girls]. I always wanted to go to the high school in “Saved by the Bell.” So I just want to give that feeling that I felt, because a lot of the new generation didn’t get to experience those shows and those feelings. So even for the younger generation, I want them to be able to experience that through my special.

What was small–town life in Millen, Ga., like for you as a funny kid growing up?

I was so poor, it wasn’t nothing really funny. The town was so small — one [stop]light, the elementary school, high school, all in one school. You had to joke your way to make you think that you weren’t there. You kind of had to escape through jokes. So I just made people laugh wherever I was. No matter how serious the situation is, I can’t do anything about it. I might as well laugh. I remember the lights went off one time when we were eating cereal. I was like, “Mama, hey, come on. I can’t see — I can’t see the milk, the cereal, the bowl. And you’re telling me I need to do my work. I think you need to go to work.” In a small town, you had to laugh because there was nothing else, there was no opportunity.

“In a small town, you had to laugh because there was nothing else, there was no opportunity,” Kountry Wayne said about growing up in Millen, Ga.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

You gravitated to music early in life, becoming a rapper before you did stand-up. What was it about performing that helped you forget about the troubles that were going on around you?

I always felt like I was onstage already, so by the time I actually got onstage, the lights never did nothing to me, or the fame and all of that. Because I’m just so thankful to be able to do stand-up and have people come and watch me do it. I never had time to really feel the fame and all of that. So I just think everything I went through in that small town helped me. Everything is a small town to me. Hollywood is still a small town to me, because whoever I know, that’s who I know; whoever I don’t know, I just don’t know ’em. Because in that small town, you were so far away from the big cities like Atlanta, New York, L.A. I was three hours from Atlanta [growing up], so I think that really helped me to get where I’m at today to do comedy the way I do it.

Just keep it “kountry.”

Yeah, keep it kountry. Man, oh, that’s the next [title of a new special].

What do you feel like is the most country aspect of you as someone who’s now a popular comedian?

My family — all my family around me. You come to my house. It’s an uncle, daddy, a sister, brother, kids everywhere. I feel like I’m the new version of “Beverly Hillbillies.” I’m in Hollywood, I’m here, but I’m still not here, so I just think that’s the most country thing about me. If you meet my family, you understand. They don’t say shrimp, we say “scrimps” or “o’er dere” [instead of] “over there.” With my accent, imagine it’s 10 times worse with my family. So I think I remind people that everybody in L.A., New York got a cousin somewhere in Mississippi, because a lot of us are from the South anyway. So I just think I remind people of simple, country people.

With the Southern flavor you bring to comedy, I kind of liken it to hip-hop, when it comes to the regional styles of different comics. How does that play into creating a special that brings the South to the world?

It’s crazy that you say that [you] think about hip-hop when I do that. I’m gonna be me so much that people who don’t know me are gonna be interested in me, because it’s different than everybody else. I feel like I’m a really country person with that Southern drawl or the way I talk. I talk like them uncles and all of that. So I just feel like it’s gonna make everybody feel at home. I didn’t try to switch it up. I’m gonna be me because I feel like, deep down, everybody knows [someone like] me somewhere. They’re gonna relate to me in some kind of way, and it feels safe because I’m being me. I’m not out there being fake, this how I talk. I’m a country boy. I’m not from the big city, and this is what I’m giving the world. And those who love it, I appreciate it. Those who don’t love it, I still love you.

“I think I remind people that everybody in L.A., New York got a cousin somewhere in Mississippi, because a lot of us are from the South anyway,” said Kountry Wayne.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

Being a dad to 10 kids is something that’s been a part of your storyline in comedy and that people have gravitated to. How does your ability to survive and make it all work play into your comedy?

Child support would really make you very, very funny. It actually plays a lot into it, because if it wasn’t for those kids, I don’t think I’d stand out as much as I am. Because we’ve heard every joke, everybody’s been funny. Come on, man, we’ve seen Jim Carrey, we’ve seen Eddie Murphy, we’ve seen Dave Chappelle. Funny has already been done. So I think what helps me stand out is my story with my kids and my family. It’s funny, but it’s still OK. This is a different perspective than we see with all those kids, the mothers, you know, but he’s not with the mothers, but he’s there with the kids, and you take care of the mothers. It’s so much of a unique situation that I think that’s what makes it stand out.

Who’s your funniest kid?

[My daughter] Honest. Honest is the funniest person in my life. Her name’s Honest, but she lies — she makes up all these stories about what happened at school. [She’ll say,] “I got arrested today.” I’ll be like, “Honest, you did get arrested?” [She’ll say,] “Well, they was about to arrest me, but they didn’t.” She reminds me of me, but she is just a little bit more witty because she don’t got no trauma like I did. I come from poverty. She’s rich. She goes to this Christian school full of white people, and she thinks she’s a white baby now. The white girls have this clip they put on their hair. She bought her clip. Now her hair not floating like theirs. Her hair is definitely stiff. I’m like, “Honest, you don’t need that clip!” She’s in dancing. She don’t go to practice. When she goes to the dance recitals, it’s clear that she can’t dance and we always ask her, “Do you know the dance?” Every time she gets there, she says, “Yeah,” but she gets there and she’s always watching the other kids. She was the only one [who’s] off.

She is so funny. I put her in the skits. She says the wittiest things. She asked me one day — I got a lot of kids — and she said, “Daddy, which one of your kids you love the most?” She said, “Do you love all your kids?” I said, “Yeah, I love all of y’all.” She said, “Well, come here. Let me talk to you right quick.” She took me to a picture I had in my man cave, “She said, ‘Well, why all of us [not in the picture]?’”… She’s my comedian.

Speaking of the skit-producing pipeline/network you‘ve developed over the last several years, how has that been instrumental to your comedy career, and also your career as sort of a producer in developing content?

I think that content helped me more [with] being known as a producer and a filmmaker and an actor. So I think it helped my acting career, the first part of my life, and all the skits helped my comedy because it was just me being funny, but the skits I put out now help people look at me more as a businessman, an entrepreneur and an actor. And it’s crazy, some people now even know me from the skits. And when they come to the [stand-up] show, they’re going to be shocked. A lot of my fans who met me when I started writing the storylines, when they see this [“Nostalgia”] special they’re like, “He never showed us that!” Because that person I am onstage, I don’t be that on social media anymore, so you have to go watch me on stand-up to give that energy that I give. But my Day 1 fans met that guy. These fans I’ve made over the last four or five years were probably equivalent to my Day 1 fans. It’s a large fan base but they don’t even know that I could [do] stand-up like that.

Comedian Kountry Wayne holds up his gold neck chain with his mom’s face on it.

(Christina House / Los Angeles Times)

That’s nostalgic in a way. I’m thinking of a TV dad like Bob Saget, who was so different when you saw him do stand-up. You’re like, “Wow, Danny Tanner is filthy!” That’s great that you can kind of separate the two personas. What do you feel is next for you in comedy?

To bring that to the big screen, for sure. All my talents and gifts that I worked on, in a way, [have] gotten better. I put the work in, I’m ready to show it on the screen. I think it’s happening organically, like the special [on] Amazon, that’s organic. I had one on Netflix now they wanted me to do one at Amazon, and I just want to show the world what I’ve been working on, and the time, energy I put into a broader scale … So I’m just excited, and I feel like a kid again, because I got so many responsibilities and kids I take care of. It took a while for me to get back to this point where I could just be an artist. Because I wanted to be an artist, but then I had a lot of kids, so I had to be a provider. But now I’m in a position where all that is handled, so I feel like a kid again when it comes to the art.