THB #579: 'Pooling The Box Office

I have been writing professionally about the box office since 1997 and have been a student of the box office since 1980 or so, as a teen buying weekly Variety from the one newsstand in Miami that I knew of that carried it, and parsing the numbers. I used to have years of special issues with the history of box office, domestic and worldwide. Etc. I am old school.

I have qualified myself in this way before because I am a little embarrassed by how frustrating I find box office coverage in the trades these days. And my primary focus is Anthony D'Alessandro, who happens to be a person I like very much and who, in his coverage, does the most thorough job as a rule, amongst the 3 trades. I really read the others as an afterthought, usually provoked by a headline that seems wrong in tone or detail.

#1 story is someone watching Lady Gaga on TV and exlaining it to readers.

I don’t need Anthony or anyone else to write it up like I would write it up. It’s a bit like liking movies (or not), really… we all have our tastes and our style.

But blockbuster openings seem to bring out the worst in everyone who covers the industry. I remember when Batman opened to a then-record $40 million in 1989… I just kept saying to everyone, “Forty… Million… Dollars!!!” But I was not publishing any writing about the industry at that time. I was a 25-year-old civilian who loved the industry (which I was working in) and was being a bit of a fanboy.

SUNDAY AM EARLY: On the heels of a killer Saturday night in Hall H at San Diego Comic-Con for Marvel, the Shawn Levy directed, produced and written Deadpool & Wolverine grossed $61.5M on Saturday, per Disney, for what is definitely a $205M opening weekend — just like we told you back in mid-June, per Quorum. There’s bound to be even more cash. Some felt it wasn’t possible for a R-rated movie — but here we are. Global is at $438.3M.

Just this opening paragraph makes me insane.

1. The Saturday night Marvel spectacular at Hall H at Comic-Con literally had/has NOTHING to do with this weekend’s box office for the film. (Do try the above at home. I think they did this same kind of thing at a Christmas pageant in 1941’s Penny Serenade and the daughter/stagehand fell on her butt. So cute.)

2. Shawn Levy does have a writing credit on Deadpool & Wolverine, but he is not one would think of as a writer/director on this movie.

3. Thanks for the clarification that the $61.5 million number is from Disney, as all the weekend numbers have been since Thursday… but even so, $205 million is very likely opening number, but not a definite one, as this piece published at 7:51a Sunday morning, meaning that the whole day of Sunday, that Disney is now projecting at $47.5 million, has not happened yet. Possible, but not definite.

More likely, it will be higher, A stat line of a $57.5m Friday and a $61.5 million Saturday, followed by a $47.5 million Sunday would be very unique. Disney is publicly projecting a drop of 22.76% on Sunday from Saturday. None of the films that have opened over $200 million has fallen as much as 20% from Saturday to Sunday. The “best” drop was Star Wars: Episode VII, which dropped just 11% and the “worst” of these - eliminating the one 4-day-weekend holiday Sunday - was Star Wars: Episode VIII, dropping 19.8%.

Using that history as a comp - which they are - D&W projects out to anywhere between $206.8 million and $212.2 million

4. That reference and link to The Quorum is shite. Firstly, The Quorum was not the only one to project $205 million. And in the article, the company’s projection is quoted thusly, “$200M-$239M, which the service actually believes is conservative.” It was not.

Second, in that same article, it is written: “At that level, it also would be the highest opening of the summer, besting even this weekend’s anticipated $120M-$130M start for Disney/Pixar’s Inside Out 2.” Not sure whether that was The Quorum or not. But it was off by 18% - 28%, on the morning Inside Out 2 was opening.

And of course, I am old enough to remember when Deadpool couldn’t open to $100 million and opened to $132 million. That was way back in 2016.

Third, both The Quorum and Deadline backed way off of that $200 million plus number for weeks before opening and more specifically, as recently as Friday morning.

Do you want to know what Disney’s highest- grossing R-rated movie was prior to Deadpool & Wolverine? 1990’s Pretty Woman at $178.4M…

Meaningless.

Per Box Office stat firm EntTelligence, Deadpool & Wolverine clocked 13.6M admissions stateside.

With due respect, that figure comes directly out of the ass and calculators of EntTelligence. I get that someone sat at a desk and worked hard to make all the numbers come together into a definitive insight. But even EntTelligence starts with the admission that they are sampling details from just over 3000 theaters… which as best as I can tell, includes only Cinemark and IMAX. So if they are “clocking” admissions, it is only in about 10% of the nation’s theaters. That is considered a reasonable survey size in most cases… but unlike most national surveys, it carries the bias/limitation of the location of the Cinemark theaters.