Endo International is a small, relatively unknown generic pharmaceutical company. That could change shortly. Saturday Night Live (“SNL”) recently ran a skit of the talk show Mellen, a new show to rival Ellen:
Post-COVID, men are staying home more than ever before and they need a daytime talk show that speaks to them. ABC thought about it for 10 seconds and came up with Mellen, the ‘male Ellen.’ Mellen, all the fun daytime energy of Ellen, with a hard masculine edge. Mellen is no holds barred, in your face entertainment. Mellen’s a ‘man’s man’ and you never know what Mellen might do next. Mellen won’t just high-five the audience, he’ll nut tap’em too. And you’d better believe there’s dancing, awkward male dancing.
It seems like the new show will be a “bro version” of Ellen, with kids slapping their teachers to get famous, and sneak-up surprises. The pilot shows Mellen, who has a striking resemblance to Jason Sudeikis, interviewing Kyrie Irving about the fact he refuses to get vaccinated. Kyrie waxes poetic about how he is the best player on the Brooklyn Nets and he will ultimately have a better career than LeBron James. Suddenly, someone sneaks up behind Kyrie and pricks him with the Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) vaccine – the one that’s about 64% effective and needs to be stored at 94.5 degrees below fahrenheit. In other words, Kyrie would still remain “unvaccinated” even after getting vaccinated.
Other than the racial overtones pursuant to Kyrie, Mellen could be a hit. At the end of the show, Mellen gave a plug to its sponsors:
Sponsored by Peyronie’s disease, not the treatment, the actual disease. Just have fun with it.
Peyronie’s disease is a noncancerous condition characterized by scar tissue that causes curvature of a man’s penis, and leads to painful erections. Curvature of the penis is no laughing matter. About one-in-ten men (about 16 million) have Peyronie’s disease. Xiaflex, provided by Endo International, is the only non-surgical treatment for the disease. Trump And The GE, the country’s top podcast on the economy, recently discussed Xiaflex and Peyronie’s Disease. SNL obviously learned about Peyronie’s disease from the show. At the 34:00 minute mark of Trump And The GE: Barbarians At The Gate For Endo (#7), Shock Exchange goes in:
Endo’s aesthetics business, with again, QWO with only one quarter of revenue, which is in the start-up phase, and Xiaflex would be about 25% of the combined (Endo and Barbarian #7) aesthetics business. Endo’s aesthetics business had revenue of $119 million and it grew 254%. The two combined would have grown about 172%. Endo’s aesthetics business has benefited from coming out of the pandemic, but it does have legs because QWO is in the start-up phase; its revenue is expected to grow by leaps and bounds …
They’ve had to be pretty judicious with their capital spending. They haven’t been able to advertise as much as they’d like to. Now they can spend more money on advertising and make people aware that there are non-surgical options for Dupuytren’s contracture and Peyronie’s disease. And as they’ve done that, they have seen an out-sized growth in Xiaflex.
Mellen seems like a hit, but secretly vaccinating Kyrie and cribbing Trump And The GE is not a good look.
