EXCLUSIVE: Longtime Lionsgate Film Distribution Head David Spitz is exiting, Deadline has learned, with former STX distribution vet Kevin Grayson getting named President of Domestic Distribution of the studio’s motion picture group. Spitz came to Lionsgate via its absorption of Blair Witch Project studio Artisan. Before that, Spitz was at Reservoir Dogs distributor, Live Entertainment
Lionsgate
At a time when theatrical is looking to distinguish itself with more prolific fare than the factory conveyor belt of humdrum product coming from streaming, it’s with great upset to hear that Lionsgate’s feature adaptation of Judy Blume’s pinnacle 1970 novel Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret fell greatly short at the box office
Global audiences have been gaga for Baba Yaga with Lionsgate/Thunder Road Films/87 Eleven’s John Wick: Chapter 4 now having passed the $400M mark worldwide. The Keanu Reeves-starrer jumped out of the gate in late March, scoring a $137.5M global debut in a best-ever for the franchise. JW4 in mid-April then became the top-grossing film in
EXCLUSIVE: Following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in late February 2022, Hollywood swore off the booming and lucrative box office territory, with the first studios, Disney and Warner Bros, respectively pulling their big movies out of the country, Turning Red and The Batman. However, this past weekend, Lionsgate’s John Wick: Chapter 4 made it through
Lionsgate Motion Picture Group Chair Joe Drake had much to celebrate this morning. The studio reaped a record global and domestic box office debut for the John Wick franchise, with John Wick: Chapter 4 making $137.5M WW and $73.5M. The fourthquel was the best-received John Wick of all-time with audiences (A CinemaScore) and critics (95%
Refresh for latest…: It was a bow-wow-wow! start for Lionsgate/Thunder Road Films/87 Eleven’s John Wick: Chapter 4 with $137.5M global this session. Of that, $64M is estimated from 71 international box office markets. All were No. 1 starts and cumulatively are 73% above John Wick 3 – Parabellum’s 2019 launch. This is a fantastic debut
EXCLUSIVE: The John Wick franchise has flourished in its post theatrical market, and strong the Keanu Reeves action series will remain in that sector. Ahead of John Wick: Chapter 4‘s opening tomorrow, Lionsgate has unveiled its largest consumer products program to date for the film. Together with the studio’s global consumer products representative, licensing giant
With overseas rollout having begun Wednesday, Lionsgate/Thunder Road Films/87 Eleven’s John Wick: Chapter 4 is off to a strong start at the international box office. Across just a handful of markets, figures we’re hearing put the early estimated cume at roughly $3.9M through Wednesday and including Australia and New Zealand’s Thursday launches. As Anthony reported,
No, there won’t be any finger-pointing at the box office this weekend over a franchise film failing to open. For, Lionsgate/Thunder Road Films/87 Eleven’s John Wick: Chapter 4 looks to not only reinvigorate a tentpole-heavy spring, but also debut to a franchise record of $115M worldwide. Broken out that’s $65M-$70M in the U.S./Canada and another
Watching Jesus Revolution surge past $45 million in ticket sales for Lionsgate—matching or besting The Fabelmans, The Banshees Of Inisherin, Tár, Women Talking and Triangle Of Sadness, combined—it finally seems safe to say it. The faith-based audience is back. Between Covid and the culture wars, it’s been a rough few years for those who make,
EXCLUSIVE: Lionsgate’s John Wick: Chapter 4 arrived on tracking today with a robust projection between $60M-$70M in what would rep the highest opening stateside for the Keanu Reeves R-rated franchise. It’s another solid opening in what is a back-to-back tentpole programmed spring. That anticipated opening for Chapter 4 would also rep the biggest opening for
FRIDAY PM: Oh no, those tepid audience exits and B CinemaScore are impacting the second weekend of Disney/Marvel Studios’ Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, which is currently seeing an OMG 71% drop with a $30M second FSS and a $7.8M second Friday, -83% (read the review). If that estimate holds, it’s worse than Thor: Love
EXCLUSIVE: Lionsgate is giving an Oscar-qualifying run to the psychological thriller Alice, Darling on December 30 before the pic’s nationwide release in 2023. The film, which made its world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival where it notched a near 90% on Rotten Tomatoes, stars Oscar nominee Anna Kendrick as a woman woman pushed to
Anne-Marie Ross (née Boysen), whose career in international film distribution at Lionsgate and Pantelion spanned more than two decades, died September 9 after a near-two-year battle with advanced-stage cancer caused by a rare gene mutation. She was 49. Ross began her career at Lionsgate in 2001, reporting to Nick Meyer, now the President of Film
“I do think the studies will get paid, like they usually do, whatever they are owed. Because we are the suppliers and that’s usually what happens,” Lionsgate vice chair Michael Burns said Wednesday of the Chapter 11 filing earlier in the day by Regal Cinemas’ parent Cineworld. “Those things seem to go through the same
Lionsgate’s English-language remake of Francis Veber’s French feature hit The Valet has been acquired by Disney’s direct-to-consumer platforms for a summer 2022 release as a Hulu Original in the U.S. and a Disney+ Star Original abroad. Directed by Richard Wong and starring Eugenio Derbez and Samara Weaving, The Valet follows Olivia (Weaving), a movie star who enlists
Lionsgate’s Nicolas Cage self parody feature The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent will open on April 22, 2022. The title was previously unset. In the action comedy, Nicolas Cage stars as… Nicolas Cage. Creatively unfulfilled and facing financial ruin, the fictionalized version of Cage must accept a $1 million offer to attend the birthday of a dangerous
It’s thrilling to watch Lionsgate make a run at the box office top spot with The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard, a grown-up comedy. Not a kiddie fantasy, like Peter Rabbit 2 or Cruella. Not a Covid-era placeholder, like The War With Grandpa, or a streaming event, like Borat Subsequent Moviefilm. But a rough, raucous, R-rated action
Lionsgate got out early with the Millennium Ryan Reynolds-Samuel L. Jackson action comedy sequel The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard with an official Wednesday debut plus last weekend paid sneaks; all totaled they’ve accumulated $3.9M at 2,940 locations. The whole reason why Lionsgate went early is to collect as much cash as possible before Universal’s F9 comes in next weekend,
Lionsgate said Wednesday that Roland Emmerich’s sci-fi pic Moonfall will be released on February 4, 2022. Halle Berry, Patrick Wilson, John Bradley, Michael Peña, Charlie Plummer, Kelly Yu, Eme Ikwuakor, Carolina Bartczak and Donald Sutherland star in the big-canvas pic, which at a reported budget of $140 million is the biggest-budget “independent” movie to shoot
Lionsgate has set a trio of release dates today, including the Samuel L. Jackson-Maggie Q action pic The PROTÉGÉ ne The Asset which will open on Aug. 20. against Universal’s Tom Hanks movie Bios and Paramount’s Paw Patrol. In addition, the new Jennifer Lopez movie, which Armie Hammer dropped out of after a social media scandal erupted, Shotgun Wedding will load up on Wednesday,
After Disney plopped its Ryan Reynolds action comedy Free Guy from 20th Century Studios on August 13, a week before Lionsgate’s sequel The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard which also stars Reynolds, it stood to reason the latter would move. The new date for the Reynolds-Samuel L. Jackson sequel, which also stars Salma Hayek, is June 16.
Lionsgate has slated Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar for a February 12 release on premium video on demand, the latest concession to a theatrical marketplace upended by Covid-19. The comedy, which was set up nearly two years ago, had originally eyed a 2020 release. It pairs Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo, who
It was supposed to be a year when the playing field became even. After losing to Disney for four years in a row, with the Burbank studio setting an industry record in 2019 of $13.2 billion global box office, a new major studio was set to become the domestic king. “I think 2020 is going
Lionsgate posted soft quarterly earnings with revenue of $745 million down 20% from $938 million the year earlier and below Wall Street expectations. The motion picture producer and distributor, which just announced it’s laying off 15% of its global motion pictures group, said it swung to a net loss of $18.4 million from a $1.8
Further meltdown here of the immediate theatrical release schedule with Lionsgate pushing their current Oct. 30 thriller Fatale to first quarter 2021 and the Colin Farrell-Lily Rose Depp sci-fi movie Voyagers off its Wednesday Nov. 25 release date to next year as well. Blame Regal largely closing, as well as New York and Los Angeles’ purgatory. The interesting
And it’s another Lionsgate film that’s skipping theatrical. We can confirm that the Sarah Paulson horror movie Run is moving off the theatrical release schedule and heading to Hulu. The streamer has acquired domestic rights from Lionsgate in what is reported to be a competitive situation. Last week, the mini-major announced that its Janelle Monae horror
If movie theaters are planning to reopen in select locations around the country in the next month, will there be any new movies out there left to program? In another case of another movie biting the dust, Lionsgate has decided that the best course of distribution financially for their movie Antebellum is to have the movie
Lionsgate has taken the Janelle Monáe horror movie Antebellum off its theatrical release schedule for the time being as big exhibition reorganizes itself during COVID-19. Previously, the Gerard Bush-Christopher Renz directed and written movie was dated for Aug. 21, but with Warner Bros. Tenet hoping to reopen theaters over Labor Day weekend, the plan is for Antebellum to go later.
UPDATED, July 17: Lionsgate said Friday that Roadside Attractions’ romantic drama The Secret: Dare To Dream, starring Katie Holmes and Josh Lucas, will be released on Premium Video on Demand on July 31. In March, the pic based on based on Rhonda Byrne’s 2006 global bestselling self-help book, had to postpone its April 17 theatrical