Taylor Swift’s Showgirl promotional film collects $42m in North America
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A billboard advertises Taylor Swift's The Official Release Party Of A Showgirl cinema release at Times Square in New York on Oct 4.
PHOTO: EPA
Brooks Barnes
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LOS ANGELES – Taylor Swift pulverised the Rock at the weekend box office.
The Official Release Party Of A Showgirl, essentially an 89-minute commercial for the American singer’s latest album The Life Of A Showgirl, sold an estimated US$33 million (S$42 million) in tickets at cinemas in the United States and Canada from Oct 3 through Oct 5, according to Comscore, which compiles box-office data.
Less a movie than a collection of bonus features on a DVD, The Official Release Party played in 3,702 cinemas and was easily No. 1.
The audience for the not-quite-a-movie was roughly 88 per cent female and 70 per cent white, according to PostTrak, a film industry research service.
Critics did not review The Official Release Party, but Swift’s fans loved what they saw. They gave it an A+ grade in CinemaScore exit polls.
Swift, 35, did not disclose how much she spent to make The Official Release Party, which collected an additional US$13 million overseas.
The singer’s return to cinemas – her concert documentary The Eras Tour was a top ticket seller in 2023 – siphoned attention away from American film-maker Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another starring Hollywood actor Leonardo DiCaprio, which fell to second place in its second weekend, collecting an estimated US$11.1 million for a new North American total of US$42.8 million.
Fans take pictures in the lobby as they attend Taylor Swift: The Official Release Party Of A Showgirl at AMC Montgomery 16 theatre in Bethesda, Maryland, on Oct 3.
PHOTO: AFP
The Smashing Machine, an A24 sports drama starring American actor Dwayne Johnson, a former professional wrestler who is known to fans as the Rock, came in a weak third. The film collected about US$6 million in wide release and cost US$40 million to make, not including marketing.
A24 had been promoting The Smashing Machine for months, in part by aggressively positioning Johnson, 53, as a possible Oscar nominee. Reviews have been warm. Ticket buyers gave the film a B grade in CinemaScore exit polls.
A24 said in a statement on Oct 5 that the film, co-starring British actress Emily Blunt and directed by American film-maker Benny Safdie, “stands as a creative achievement that will resonate far beyond opening weekend”.
Swift’s cinematic stunt – she said The Official Release Party would play for only one weekend – was a surprise win for cinema owners, many of whom are still trying to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic.
Multiplexes in the US and Canada had their worst summer since 1981, after adjusting for inflation and excluding the pandemic years, when many cinemas were closed for long periods.
But Swift’s movie was less enthusiastically received in Hollywood. Some studio executives were annoyed that she dropped The Official Release Party on the theatrical release schedule with only two weeks’ notice.
The pop star also managed to fill a lot of seats with almost no marketing, relying nearly entirely on her own social media feeds and coverage by the news media. Studios spend tens of millions of dollars on promotional campaigns for wide-release movies. NYTIMES
