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Friday October 13 is upon us, which means the wait is finally over to see Cannes 2023 Palme d’Or winner Anatomy of a Fall! Har har, I jest. No, the real countdown is for Taylor Swift. This weekend Tay Tay is set to achieve world box office domination with the release of her concert movie Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour in AMC Theatres. And when I say AMC Theatres, I mean every AMC venue location in the US, plus affiliated venues globally. Adult ticket prices (measured by age, not maturity) are $19.89 to tie in with the release of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) on October 27, while child and senior tickets are $13.13 because it’s her lucky number. I’d make a comment about the very specific prices being twee, but between me and Taylor, I’m not the millionaire! Sigh. And speaking of millions, I think this math checks out: Every AMC Theatre + Inflated Ticket Prices + The Snake Fam = Taylor Swift owns us all. More on the obscene amounts of money she’s about to make:
Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour is headed for a record global opening for a concert film of $150 million to $200 million, including $100 million to $125 million in North America and $50 million to $75 million overseas.
AMC Theatres, which is distributing the concert pic on behalf of the superstar pop singer, is sticking to the more conservative estimate of $150 million globally, including $100 million domestically.
Swift’s film will begin screening 6 p.m. local time on Friday in more than 8,500 cinemas in roughly 100 countries, including in every AMC location in the U.S. Generally, a movie holds previews Thursday night before officially opening on Friday morning. (Eras Tour’s truncated release makes it more difficult to predict its opening.)
In an unprecedented move, Swift’s team bypassed Hollywood studios and partnered directly with the world’s largest exhibitor — to bring the film to the big screen. AMC in turn is making Eras Tour available to other chains.
As of late last week, the concert film had racked up more than $100 million in advance ticket sales. And numerous shows in the U.S. are sold out over opening weekend.
Eras Tour will easily score the highest launch of all time for a concert film, as well as becoming the top-grossing concert pic of all time in its first weekend alone. It also should boast one of the biggest openings of the year despite its hefty running time of two hours and 48 minutes…
AMC CEO Adam Aron pulled off a coup in nabbing distribution rights to Taylor Swift’s concert pic, which attracted the attention of multiple Hollywood studios, according to insiders. It’s unorthodox for a mega-theater circuit to distribute a movie since producers and filmmakers generally want a distributor with experience in marketing. At the same time, Eras Tour isn’t a normal release and will only play in theaters Thursday through Sunday after the first weekend. As of now, its plan is to play for four weekends.
The sky-high demand to see the movie comes after many consumers were unable to get tickets to see the Eras concert live. Swift’s tour, kicking off in March, smashed records in terms of attendance and revenue. It is now concluded in the U.S., with the pop singer She doesn’t begin touring overseas until November.
I poked fun at the reasoning behind the inflated ticket prices, but really I think you just have to look at it as a super deal on concert tix and pretend it’s not a movie. And even though the lion’s share of the proceeds will go to Taylor (sorry Swifties, “snake’s share” just doesn’t sound as good), she is the only touring artist — that we know of — who has gifted her tour crew, dancers, and truck drivers with six-figure bonuses. With the international leg of the Eras Tour beginning next month, I wouldn’t be surprised if we see more generosity from her before the end of the Eras era.
So yes, Taylor’s about to make eleventy billion dollars, but the real story that’s gonna last here is the distribution flex she made. To eschew the studios completely, and while the studios are still in the middle of a strike with SAG-AFTRA? Love it. You don’t have to be a Silicon Valley bro with unkempt hair to be a disruptor! That line about filmmakers turning to studio distributors for marketing savvy killed me. Please, Taylor has the NFL tripping over themselves to spotlight her, FOR FREE.
GET. IT. TAYLOR. you might not like her music, or her style, or even her pap walks. but you gotta respect her as sharp in the business realm. what’s more great about this deal is close to 50% of the profits will go directly to the movie theaters, which is great to support local economies.
Love that picture with Beyonce, and she posted a nice pic of them together with a very nice caption about how Beyonce is her idol and path-maker for other female artists.
Hangonamin – agree completely with this. I’m a big fan of her as an artist anyway – I would say I’m like the Gap of Swifties (not nearly as fervent as Banana Republic level Swifties but more than the casual Old Navy Swiftie, if you will). But I am a huge, huge, fan of Taylor Swift the business Boss Ass B!tch (to steal a line from Ted Lasso). What she has done is beyond awe inspiring. Re-recording her library to obtain ownership of her masters, producing the most lucrative world tour in history, circumventing the studios to distribute a film about that tour while that tour still has months of dates to perform – I can’t decide if the film will inspire fans to pay up for concert tickets to see it live now that they’ve gotten a taste of it or if the film will be enough to scratch that itch but either way, she’s going to make BANK. And good for her!!!! That quote in an interview- “am I being too loud? In my house? That I bought with songs I wrote about my life????” says it all. She has put in the work and has earned every cent. Some moves may be money grabs, like releasing 8 different versions of the same album with different cover art but if fans want to pay for it, so be it. Her product sells!!! And that tour is so successful for a reason. Every review (and every celebrity who has gone has been effusive in their praise as well) has been that she puts on an incredible show (more than three hours!!!) and concert goers get their money’s worth.
And her philanthropy in terms of sharing some of the wealth from her tour is so commendable. Not just the bonuses to team members who normally don’t get anything but also the food bank donations she made in every city and the incredible boost to the local economies everywhere she went….it’s phenomenal.
I hope Taylor returns the favor and joins Beyonce for Beyonce’s concert movie premiere. I know she will.
Given that movie theatres have not been in the greatest shape in recent years Barbenheimer and now this have been a real boost.
I was thinking about seeing the film, but I’ve read that two of my favourite songs from the setlist have cut from the film. I’m not a huge Swiftie and don’t really know enough of her catalogue to sit through 2.5+ hours for the remaining 4 or 5 songs I’m familiar with.
I was bummed about one of them (no spoilers) because the optics were amazing at the show, but two of the others weren’t even in the show I went to—one of them plays in the credits—and the last one, I loved it but it’s not a banger. like there’s no amazing dancing/production around it in the show that we’ll be missing out on. I’m excited to see what footage they put in since they took out several songs.
Great AMC took money from the studio marketers I guess but I googled
AMC CEO Adam Aron
Turns out he’s just another married dude who likes to send naked pictures of himself to not his wife and got caught in an extortion scandal. Gross.
Not a huge AMC fan but if this gets people back to the theaters I think that’s great.
We just left the theater after seeing it IN IMAX with my kids. We were not lucky enough to get tickets (and whoa did I try) so the ticket prices to take my daughters to the theater was 100% worth it.
I will absolutely go see the Beyoncé renaissance film in the theater as well.
She’s not only incredibly talented, but she’s focused – and has been for YEARS. I only wish I could’ve/would’ve had my life as together when I was her age. Go Taylor!