Why is there such a fascination with weekend box office gross?
The box office race has become like the Top 10 chart. I grew up listening to what the Top 10 was, and how it changed from week to weekend. I think that box office has turned into that. When you can make $50 million in your opening weekend in box office, that’s pretty good publicity. So, as much as the studios complain about box office, they use it as part of their marketing machine. Most times, three out of 10 isn’t bad. But in the box office, it’s a disaster. Why is that? When you come in third on any given weekend, it means that the next weekend you’re probably going to be fifth or sixth. And if you’re not in the top five, you might as well not be there, because people are not going to notice the movie as much. Fewer people will go and you’ll disappear very quickly, because there’s new movies coming in every week. So you don’t want to open at number three. You want to open at number two or, hopefully, number one. Do you think that affects what the moviegoer goes to see? Absolutely. I
