Netflix Record $15M First Week Of ‘Glass Onion’: What It Means For Box Office, Streaming & How It Came To Be - Deadline

Over the 5-day Thanksgiving stretch, Netflix’s one-week sneak preview of Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery buried each caller and aged large workplace big counterprogramming with an estimated $13.3M over 5-days for what is projected to beryllium a $15M archetypal week by Tuesday.

Far and away, this is the champion theatrical motorboat ever for a Netflix pre-streaming movie. Last year‘s Dwayne Johnson-Ryan Reynolds-Gal Gadot enactment rubric Red Notice is arguably their best, with a $1.25M-$1.5M 3 time opening. That pic is besides their most-watched worldwide astatine 364M-plus hours. Glass Onion‘s 3-day of $9.3M is the 10th-best for a rubric opening successful little than 900 theaters, notching conscionable supra specified movies arsenic TriStar’s The Doors in 1991 ($9.1M astatine 840 theaters) and Universal’s 2004 Nov. 12-14 motorboat of Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, which posted $8.68M astatine 530 theaters.

This Thanksgiving, nary 1 successful monolithic droves wanted to spot a Korean Navy combatant aviator movie (Devotion astatine $9M 3-day) a cannibals’ emotion communicative (Bones and All at $3.5M) oregon the autobiopic of Steven Spielberg (The Fabelmans at $3.1M). For executives wondering, ‘Gosh, what benignant of big fare works successful a pugnacious marketplace?’, surely not this somber stuff. It’s a sequel to a beloved, comedic whodunit with a glitzy formed that includes Daniel Craig, Janelle Monae, Dave Bautista, Edward Norton, Kate Hudson etc. It stands to crushed that Knives Out 2 would termination implicit Thanksgiving successful its constricted release: The archetypal 1 backmost astatine Thanksgiving 2019 was a crowd-pleaser, ranking 2nd with $41.4M successful its 5-day, and legged retired to $165.3M stateside.

The faltering of Disney Animation’s $135M accumulation Strange World with a paltry $28M planetary start, and the agleam spot of Netflix’s experimentation with Knives Out 2 (playing the apical 3 circuits –AMC, Regal, and Cinemark– a archetypal for the streamer) implicit the vacation has prompted questions astir what’s ripe for streaming and what’s close for theatrical.

The reply is some are ripe for theatrical, and Netflix is leaving monolithic monies connected the array successful ancillaries and the biggest model ever with their 1 week play of the Rian Johnson-directed, Ram Bergman-produced sequel, which they picked up arsenic a two-pic bundle for $400M+ as Deadline archetypal reported.

As Wall Street dotes connected streamer studios to amusement them the money, specifically nett and not the subs, however does a conglom adjacent rationalize oregon amortize those tentpole costs? Already, majors similar Warner Bros and Disney are changing their tune successful regards to the types of direct-to-streaming titles they nonstop to the service; the former’s CEO David Zaslav is publically against specified costly concern practices. Netflix could person gone wide and much exhibitors could person been capable to stock successful the riches of Glass Onion.

Disney is milking each it tin from the dud that is Strange World. Both movies volition deed their respective workplace streaming services astatine Christmas. However, Glass Onion will spell dark, retired of theaters, until Dec. 23, erstwhile it debuts connected Netflix.

How did Glass Onion come to beryllium with the apical 3 circuits connected board? I perceive that Netflix offered large terms, 1 concatenation telling maine that they were lone charged successful the 40% rental scope (vs. 60%-70% by a large studio) with the streamer kicking successful 4x the magnitude of wealth toward exhibitors’ selling for the sequel than a regular workplace does connected an mean title. A done deal. Cinemark was the lone large 3 concatenation that had antecedently played Netflix movies, opening successful the pandemic of 2020, and was astir to alteration that booking program until Knives Out 2 came along, I understand. This is the archetypal that Netflix has enactment immoderate umpf successful a theatrical title’s selling launch, the streamer known to walk millions implicit an awards contender’s agelong play passim Oscar season.

While TV advertisement walk analytics corp iSpot showed that Netflix spent little than the majors to open Glass Onion with $4.3M successful TV spots to Disney’s $16M on Strange World, Sony’s $14.8M on Devotion, Searchlight’s $10.8M on The Menu and Uni’s $8.5M on The Fabelmans; the streamer cautiously curated their spots successful a holistic run (which volition tally done its streaming driblet date) with ads connected Sunday NFL, Yellowstone, SNL and The Walking Dead finale. At a section AMC northbound of LA successful Porter Ranch, determination were hardly immoderate standees successful the lobby during the opening play of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever for different titles — but for Glass Onion.

Some tiny exhibitors couldn’t get Knives Out 2, with the streamer booking the champion of the champion successful cinemas. Top theaters, I’m told, for Glass Onion were AMC Lincoln Square NYC, Cineplex Odeon Varsity successful Toronto, AMC Burbank, AMC Century City, AMC Boston Common, Alamo Drafthouse Brooklyn, AMC Grove LA, AMC Disney Springs 24 successful Buena Vista, Fl, AMC Empire 25 NYC, and AMC Dine-In Thoroughbred successful Franklin, TN.

No PostTrak exits connected Knives Out 2 because it’s nether 800 runs. However, connected Rotten Tomatoes, moviegoers embraced the sequel astatine 93%. The archetypal movie received an A-. Rival distributors stay irate this greeting that Netflix didn’t publically study oregon stock their grosses. Netflix didn’t supply remark for this article.

After a large level motorboat present similar Glass Onion, normally a large workplace would summation its theatrical footprint and spell wider. However, Netflix has said that they volition firmly propulsion Knives Out 2 after Tuesday earlier the pic heads to the service. Theaters are invited to re-book the rubric aft it arrives connected Netflix successful December.

But past again, we’re successful a topsy-turvy, post-pandemic world. So, don’t beryllium amazed if thing changes.

Will Netflix alteration their tune and clasp theatrical for their large tentpoles?

We’ll see. But Glass Onion was a large commencement for everyone.