TruTV’s surprise winter feature sleeper Impractical Jokers: The Movie will be available on Wednesday, April 1, April Fool’s Day, just five weeks after its theatrical play due to the national shutdown of cinemas during the COVID-19 pandemic. Again no shocker here about the early home release given how all current theatrical releases such as Onward, Sonic
Breaking News
The specialty box office space has quickly adapted to the changing film landscape as many are shifting to virtual theatrical openings. Many indie and arthouse titles do day and date releases and are VOD-only so the transition, for the most part, is familiar territory for many distributors and production companies. Written and directed by Jonathan
From Saturday, a first batch of 205 cinemas will re-open for business in Shanghai. This follows last weekend’s opening of 500+ theaters in other China provinces, though Shanghai becomes the first tier one city to turn the lights back on as the coronavirus reportedly abates in the Middle Kingdom. The Shanghai municipal government made the
Kino Lorber’s Kino Marquee initiative, which looks to help arthouses at a time when they’ve been shuttered in the coronavirus climate, has mushroomed from 12 theaters last week to 150 including Alamo Drafthouse and Laemmle Theaters. For the price of $12, Kino Marquee is streaming last year’s Cannes Grand Jury Prize winner, Bacurau, on arthouses’
Today Scott Cooper issued an open letter, applauding the Senate’s passage of the $2.2 trillion relief bill as a “much-need positive news to an industry I cherish”, particularly in regards to how it’s primed to help movie theaters during this time when they have fixed costs to maintain over several months, and zero revenue coming
As the coronavirus reportedly continues to abate in China, film authorities are taking an everything old is new again approach. As of last count there were about 500 movie theaters open in the world’s second biggest box office hub. And as this expands, some of them may soon be playing such favorites as the Avengers
EXCLUSIVE: Deadline hears that the biggest exhibitor in the world, AMC Theatres, has furloughed 600 employees in their Leawood, KS home office. Health insurance will remain intact for all of them, however, for those not receiving any cushion, they’ll have to figure out a way to pay for their policies during the time that the chain
In advance of the Senate’s passage of the $2 trillion relief bill, The National Association of Theatre Owners already is celebrating the agreement as a big win for movie theaters, particularly the $454B loan guarantee fund which will help cinemas get by on their fixed costs as local and state governments force a shutdown out of
Editors’ Note: With full acknowledgment of the big-picture implications of a pandemic that already has claimed thousands of lives, cratered global economies and closed international borders, Deadline’s Coping With COVID-19 Crisis series is a forum for those in the entertainment space grappling with myriad consequences of seeing a great industry screech to a halt. The hope is for an
With the closure of movie theaters nationwide out of safety during the coronavirus, layoffs have been rampant, however, the big three exhibitors have been contending with these atrocious times in varying degrees of severity. Word began to spread last week among distribution folks that Regal had been the most acerbic out of the three chains
After last week setting a May 4 deadline to decide if CineEurope would go ahead as planned this June, organizers at Film Expo Group have now said they are postponing the major exhibition convention to August. Originally scheduled for June 22-25 in Barcelona, Spain, the annual event has been moved to August 3-6. Keeping safety
Warner Bros. is pushing its forthcoming summer theatrical releases until the coronavirus crisis calms down and exhibition makes a full-steam comeback. Despite reports that Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman 1984 was headed to streaming, the movie is in fact still going theatrical, and that was always the plan. Wonder Woman 1984 is now moving from its June 5
Editors’ Note: With full acknowledgment of the big-picture implications of a pandemic that has already claimed thousands of lives, cratered global economies and closed international borders, Deadline’s Coping With COVID-19 Crisis series is a forum for those in the entertainment space grappling with myriad consequences of seeing a great industry screech to a halt. The
No shocker here but Sony’s Bad Boys for Life, like several other current theatrical releases of late, will be available in homes as early as March 31 on digital, and on 4K Ultra HD, Blu-Ray, and DVD on April 21. The film opened on Jan. 17 so technically in regards to its DVD drop, Bad Boys for
Even with a majority of the nation’s movie theaters shuttered due to the coronavirus outbreak, and distributors holding back on box office reporting and new releases, there continued to be a handful of cinemas around the country that braved this weekend, and kept their doors open. And for that, they should be commended. Depending on
As the number of new cases of the coronavirus shows signs of abating in China, a smattering of cinemas re-opened in a handful of provinces across the country this weekend. On Friday, there were 486 movie theaters back at work, while Saturday the total was upped to 507, local reports say. This reps just 4.5%
Despite Senate Democrats blocking the near $2 trillion stimulus package intended to rescue the U.S. economy during the coronavirus crisis, the National Association of Theatre Owners chief John Fithian is “hopeful” that a bipartisan compromise will be reached in the near future. “They’re not at an impasse,” Fithian told Deadline Sunday. “This is just part
Warner Bros.’ current theatrical release The Way Back joins the pack of recent pics making their way into homes much sooner as the coronavirus crisis has shuttered cinemas nationwide. The pic will be available for electronic sell-through stateside on Tuesday, March 24, which is the same day that Birds of Prey will be made available, at the
As theaters shutter and big studio films postpone wide theatrical releases, indie and arthouse films are trying their best to navigate the waters of the coronavirus outbreak. Like big banner titles, many indie films that were set to release this weekend are opting to delay their debuts, while a handful are opting for a digital
The National Association of Theatre Owners likes some of the elements of a coronavirus crisis relief package put forward by Senate Republicans because it includes employee assistance. business access to government-backed loans and tax postponement. The $1 trillion legislation, introduced on Thursday, includes $1,200 cash payments to individual taxpayers up to $75,000, as well as
Paramount’s hit winter feature Sonic the Hedgehog, which charted the best opening ever for a videogame movie at $100M WW, will be available for digital purchase on March 31, followed by a 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray, DVD and for rental on demand or disc on May 19. The pic was part of the studio’s turnaround under 20th
Stocks rose Friday morning, dipped, then rose again as the market continued a rocky ride, exhibitors struggled to hold on to gains and WarnerMedia parent AT&T scrapped a major stock repurchase plan to conserve cash. Investors are weighing a massive stimulus package being finalized by Congress against the rapid spread of the coronavirus infection, corporate
EXCLUSIVE: We understand that this has been in the works for a while, but the Media Rights Capital/Paramount comedy The Lovebirds is heading over to Netflix. The movie was originally expected to open April 3 theatrically, but like several other titles, was pulled from the release schedule due to the exhibition coronavirus shutdown. A streaming date for the
This was inevitable given last night’s news that Disney was suspending global box office reporting for the time being: Comscore, the B.O. reporting agency and data cross-ways for exhibitors and distributors, is no longer issuing a North American Top 10, Global chart or commentary in the weekends ahead while theaters are shutdown. Essentially, if one
S&P Global struck again at the showbiz sector, this time at distressed cinema advertising, putting National Cinemedia and Screenvision on credit watch negative as movie theaters are shuttered and advertising at risk. Ratings agencies like S&P Global, Moody’s and Fitch can be quiet for years and are rarely public facing – but they emerge in
Just to give you an idea of how bad things are right now at the box office… While yesterday reached the lowest we’ve seen at the domestic B.O. with $260K for all titles, it’s not a historical low yet because we haven’t seen how horrible today is yet. Yesterday was -98% from the third Wednesday
Disney, which has had the No. 1 movie over the last two weekends with Pixar’s Onward, as the coronavirus crisis has gripped the nation and shut down movie theaters nationwide, has announced it won’t be reporting numbers going forward. While many will say, “Well, duh” given how 4,933 domestic theaters are closed (repping 96% of the North
Adam Aron, CEO of the nation’s largest movie chain said “the industry has to get liquidity from somewhere” since “we all have expenses and none of us have revenue” after exhibitors closed their doors across the country amidst the spreading coronavirus pandemic. “I am here as a representative of our industry. … The reality is
Illumination/Universal’s Minions: The Rise Of Gru has been moved off of its global release which was previously set for late June in some offshore markets and for July 3 domestically. This is another casualty of the coronavirus pandemic as Illumination’s Mac Guff studio in Paris has been temporarily shuttered in abidance with the current lockdown
With the nation’s exhibition infrastructure on its knees, and temporarily closed down due to the coronavirus pandemic, Columbia Pictures is making their Vin Diesel action pic Bloodshot available for electronic sell-through on March 24 for the retail price of $19.99. The movie opened at the box office this past Friday to $9.1M and in the wake