base talk Did Wicked underperform at the box office?

[Donquizote]

8 minutes ago, lustforyou said:

Ummm no lmao. It's a smash hit. Before the opening week, the common prediction by actual box office watchers seemed to be in the 500s. For, like, 3 days when reviews first came in some people got caught up and predicted $1 billion, which was never realistically in the cards. It's now going to do $650-$750M (it has insane legs + still has to open in Japan which should do well since Japan typically loves fantasy movies and the play was a success there). Majority of that from the US, which has a better profit split for studios anyways; it will end as the 3rd highest grossing movie domestically of 2024 behind Deadpool & Wolverine and Inside Out 2 (one of the most successful films of all time). It will also likely do great in PVOD, digital sales, and streaming due to its very likely presence in the Oscars. And the Oscar noms of course bringing prestige to the studio, which is another nice perk. 
 

But anyways, looking at purely the box office numbers, it's doing about $700M off a $160M budget. The breakeven rule for big budget blockbusters is typically 2.5x the budget, meaning it's doing at least $300M in profit. Likely a decent bit more since it's domestic heavy (which again, means higher revenue split for the studios), has a successful soundtrack moving units, will have stronger-than-average digital sales, and is probably selling a good amount of merch. 
 

The marketing budget is estimated to "only" be about $150M (which is factored into the 2.5 rule btw) which is a very normal budget for a blockbuster movie. The rollout only felt so massive for a few reasons, mostly these 3:

 

- Ariana is one of the biggest "tabloid" celebrities in the world, meaning she generated a ton of earned media value that even a typical famous movie star wouldn't (this is at no cost to a studio)

 

- Everyone on this form is either a straight woman or gay man, interested in pop music/culture, and likely between 15 and 40 years old, meaning you were the prime target audience that the marketing team segmented for so your algorithm was inundated with more ads than the average person

 

- A ton of brand partnerships were made for this movie because it has high brand recognition and sales potential. The studio did not pay for Wicked partnerships with Mattel and all those other brands; an agreement was made between the studio and each brand/company because both parties determined a partnership was beneficial to themselves. The partnership raises awareness of the movie to sell tickets, and the association with the movies sells products to boost the brands' profits

 

Okay I'm done lol. And no I'm not even an obsessed Ariana Stan or anything, I've just always been really big into tracking/following the box office + I work in marketing and PR in the entertainment industry 

Clock ha

[mylicious]

No it's a huge success!

[Mikeymoonshine]

I think it could still hit 700 million which is huge for a movie musical. Only Disney have crossed 1 billion with movie musicals so if it didn't make a profit then they spent way too much on it. 

[Stuart]

I think that dubbing the songs was a big mistake. Many of us have heard Defying Gravity in the trailer or on social media so we wanted to hear Cynthia sing, not someone else whose vocal skills don't match Cynthia's. Same for Ariana, many of her international fans wanted to go see her and listen to her voice.

[Prisoner]

It did very well for a musical

[ICLDXU4HS]

2 hours ago, Achilles. said:

I mean, hit musicals usually fall in the $400-$500 million range (La La Land, Les Miserables, A Star is Born, The Greatest Showman…) so it did substantially better than most films of its kind. 
 

It only underperformed internationally, and only in select markets. 

If anything, it should be compared to Disney's musical live-action adaptations with human leads (Aladdin, The Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid) instead of those musical dramas for adults with heavy themes. They're all fantasy movies/fairytales with singing and mostly for children.

[Lovett]

39 minutes ago, ICLDXU4HS said:

If anything, it should be compared to Disney's musical live-action adaptations with human leads (Aladdin, The Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid) instead of those musical dramas for adults with heavy themes. They're all fantasy movies/fairytales with singing and mostly for children.

I disagree. Wicked isn't a live-action adaptation of an animated film; it's a film adaptation of a stage musical, so it should be compared to the other stage musical adaptations. Animated Disney films are much more globally well-known IP than Wicked, so again, this would be an unfair comparison.

 

WIcked is on track to become the highest-grossing movie musical of all time. I don't see how anyone could argue that it has under-performed at the box office.

[kimberly]

Highest grossing musical adaptations of ALL-TIME:

 

 

[IBeMe]

Kinda tbh. It's the type of movie u expect to clear 800m+ 

still doing well overall and prob made up all its budget and then some by now 

[Lovett]

2 minutes ago, IBeMe said:

It's the type of movie u expect to clear 800m+ 

No musical adaptation has ever cleared 800m. Hell, none have ever cleared 700m.

[Jay07]

It was never doing a billion, that was wishful thinking. Wicked doesn't have the brand recognition of something like Barbie and even though it's rated G it's a lot darker than your typical Disney live action remake, it's not a kids movie. It's a little soft overseas but it's a smash domestically, especially for a Broadway adaptation. 

Edited yesterday at 10:30 AM by Jay07

[SleepNoMore]

Talk about creating false goalposts to force a fake narrative of "failure" on what is already the most successful movie based on a musical of all time. These numbers are objectively amazing and trying to spin them as anything other than a screaming success only shows your ignorance about the current film industry. 

[RideOrDie]

2 hours ago, Stuart said:

I think that dubbing the songs was a big mistake. Many of us have heard Defying Gravity in the trailer or on social media so we wanted to hear Cynthia sing, not someone else whose vocal skills don't match Cynthia's. Same for Ariana, many of her international fans wanted to go see her and listen to her voice.

omg the songs were dubbed??? 

[Dante Silva]

Would Ari really be giving up her successful singing career to focus on other acting roles if this had been a flop? Please be serious.

[Gaia]

3 hours ago, lustforyou said:

Ummm no lmao. It's a smash hit. Before the opening week, the common prediction by actual box office watchers seemed to be in the 500s. For, like, 3 days when reviews first came in some people got caught up and predicted $1 billion, which was never realistically in the cards. It's now going to do $650-$750M (it has insane legs + still has to open in Japan which should do well since Japan typically loves fantasy movies and the play was a success there). Majority of that from the US, which has a better profit split for studios anyways; it will end as the 3rd highest grossing movie domestically of 2024 behind Deadpool & Wolverine and Inside Out 2 (one of the most successful films of all time). It will also likely do great in PVOD, digital sales, and streaming due to its very likely presence in the Oscars. And the Oscar noms of course bringing prestige to the studio, which is another nice perk. 
 

But anyways, looking at purely the box office numbers, it's doing about $700M off a $160M budget. The breakeven rule for big budget blockbusters is typically 2.5x the budget, meaning it's doing at least $300M in profit. Likely a decent bit more since it's domestic heavy (which again, means higher revenue split for the studios), has a successful soundtrack moving units, will have stronger-than-average digital sales, and is probably selling a good amount of merch. 
 

The marketing budget is estimated to "only" be about $150M (which is factored into the 2.5 rule btw) which is a very normal budget for a blockbuster movie. The rollout only felt so massive for a few reasons, mostly these 3:

 

- Ariana is one of the biggest "tabloid" celebrities in the world, meaning she generated a ton of earned media value that even a typical famous movie star wouldn't (this is at no cost to a studio)

 

- Everyone on this form is either a straight woman or gay man, interested in pop music/culture, and likely between 15 and 40 years old, meaning you were the prime target audience that the marketing team segmented for so your algorithm was inundated with more ads than the average person

 

- A ton of brand partnerships were made for this movie because it has high brand recognition and sales potential. The studio did not pay for Wicked partnerships with Mattel and all those other brands; an agreement was made between the studio and each brand/company because both parties determined a partnership was beneficial to themselves. The partnership raises awareness of the movie to sell tickets, and the association with the movies sells products to boost the brands' profits

 

Okay I'm done lol. And no I'm not even an obsessed Ariana Stan or anything, I've just always been really big into tracking/following the box office + I work in marketing and PR in the entertainment industry 

Marketing isn't the full picture.

 

https://deadline.com/2024/11/wicked-marketing-record-advertiser-list-1236187221/

 

This movie has been quite literally everywhere. You cannot live in the US and essentially not see promo for this movie in grocery stores, at restaurants, etc. and while not all of it may have been a part of "marketing" budget since they may not have "paid" for it per se, it absolutely does go into the perception of its performance. 

 

It near doubled the promotional push of Avengers Endgame and Infinity War and did double the push for Avatar: TWOTW. 

 

People saying "Oh this did unprecedentedly well for a musical!" like no ****, it got even more promo than massively anticipated Avenger/Avatar movies. Musical or not, grossing 650-700M despite more push than 2B boxoffice movies is not a flex.

Edited yesterday at 10:54 AM by Gaia

[Stuart]

15 minutes ago, RideOrDie said:

omg the songs were dubbed??? 

Maybe not in every country but they definitely are in the french version, I heard some snippets on Twitter and they sound awful 

[RideOrDie]

1 minute ago, Stuart said:

Maybe not in every country but they definitely are in the french version, I heard some snippets on Twitter and they sound awful 

terrible decision

 

[Genie in a Bottle]

2 hours ago, Stuart said:

I think that dubbing the songs was a big mistake. Many of us have heard Defying Gravity in the trailer or on social media so we wanted to hear Cynthia sing, not someone else whose vocal skills don't match Cynthia's. Same for Ariana, many of her international fans wanted to go see her and listen to her voice.

They dubbed the songs with other singers so it would still be in the right language?? That is so effing dumb lmao…. Ariana grande is a GLOBAL pop star…. No wonder it flopped internationally 

[bjorn]

31 minutes ago, SleepNoMore said:

Talk about creating false goalposts to force a fake narrative of "failure" on what is already the most successful movie based on a musical of all time. These numbers are objectively amazing and trying to spin them as anything other than a screaming success only shows your ignorance about the current film industry. 

 
Clearly "under performing" seem to be a triggering word. My question was genuinely out of curiosity. And yeah that's why I asked because I wanted an answer. And I got it from some members here now. 

[illia]

2 hours ago, Stuart said:

I think that dubbing the songs was a big mistake. Many of us have heard Defying Gravity in the trailer or on social media so we wanted to hear Cynthia sing, not someone else whose vocal skills don't match Cynthia's. Same for Ariana, many of her international fans wanted to go see her and listen to her voice.

Lmao this is exactly why I didn't go to the cinema for this. There were showings in English but they were only once a day on the most random schedule 

[eclipsed]

Universal probably was thinking it would do more, I did kinda expect it to cross 1b since its the biggest marketing campaign since Barbie. Internationally is where it was let down. I guess it being a musical and the steep runtime stopped it from pulling 1b nonethess they made their money back and a couple 100m more plus its a huge awards contender

 

4 hours ago, Achilles. said:

I mean, hit musicals usually fall in the $400-$500 million range (La La Land, Les Miserables, A Star is Born, The Greatest Showman…) so it did substantially better than most films of its kind. 
 

It only underperformed internationally, and only in select markets. 

Thing is most of these had way smaller budgets so they actually turned more of a profit especially ASIB and La La Land maybe The Greatest Showman also.

[wigglytuffer]

It'll also probably get a limited re-release before Wicked Part 2 next year which will add around 100m to the gross 

[OrbitNumber1]

It's not an underperformance by any means, but it's surprising that it didn't make bigger numbers since the marketing campaign was so huge. Universal probably expected it to be this year's Barbie. I wonder what this means for the sequel since they will lower their expectations on international markets, I believe it will have a smaller campaign.

[Jay07]

7 hours ago, Gaia said:

Marketing isn't the full picture.

 

https://deadline.com/2024/11/wicked-marketing-record-advertiser-list-1236187221/

 

This movie has been quite literally everywhere. You cannot live in the US and essentially not see promo for this movie in grocery stores, at restaurants, etc. and while not all of it may have been a part of "marketing" budget since they may not have "paid" for it per se, it absolutely does go into the perception of its performance. 

 

It near doubled the promotional push of Avengers Endgame and Infinity War and did double the push for Avatar: TWOTW. 

 

People saying "Oh this did unprecedentedly well for a musical!" like no ****, it got even more promo than massively anticipated Avenger/Avatar movies. Musical or not, grossing 650-700M despite more push than 2B boxoffice movies is not a flex.

No matter the push, a musical will not do as well as something as a Marvel movie that had been setting up for a decade. Also, despite your perception, the marketing budget was typically equal to production budget. It is absolutely a flex to be the most succesful movie musical of all time, which this movie will be eventually.

 

It's so frustrating that people will argue against common sense, probably because of their own anti-Ariana feelings. Comparing Wicked to Endgame? Really? The majority of people balk at the very mention of singing in their movies.

Edited 21 hours ago by Jay07

[Mikeymoonshine]

I think the international numbers are because while the wicked musical is huge in the US and a few other countries it's not as big or as well known globally. So it's relying on Ariana hype and being a Wizard Of Oz spin off hype for everywhere else. Some people were put off by the dub, it's also quite a long film. The international numbers will still grow but it's not shocking that it's domestic was so much bigger when you think about how big the stage musical is in the US. It's already out performed Le Mis which was also a really popular musical and it will likely outdo Mama Mia too. Musicals are still a niche can't really be compared to the Disney ones imo. Disney movie musicals always had mainstream appeal that broadway musicals don't have.