There seems to be something going on with Sydney Sweeney and the media covering her films
Sydney Sweeney has been the subject of a lot of controversies as of late. But what I want to focus on is how media outlets have been covering the release of her two new films, Americana and Eden.
Some background:
Americana is a genre film. It was shot and screened in 2023 to relatively positive reviews. The company that financed it, Bron, went bankrupt shortly after the film's screening. Due to this bankruptcy Lionsgate was able to acquire the rights to the film for cheap. While the film was made on a nine million dollar budget, Lionsgate purchased it for three million, with two million of that coming from international rights sales. Meaning that Lionsgate only spent one million acquiring the domestic distribution rights. In order to get more VOD sales and streaming deals, Lionsgate gave the film a small theatrical release with next to nothing in marketing.
Eden premiered at TIFF in 2024. Directed by Ron Howard the film also stars Jude Law, Vanessa Kirby, Ana De Armas, and Daniel Bruhl along with Sweeney. The film was financed at a net cost of 35 million dollars. It received mixed to negative reviews and only Netflix was willing to purchase it. Ron Howard opted to go with a smaller distributor, Vertical (who are mostly known for straight-to-video trash but have been slowly building themselves as a more legitimate art-house distributor), due to wanting a theatrical release which no one wanted to give the film. Vertical made a deal for less than 20 million dollars for the film.
Now, each distributor had their reasons for acquiring each film. Lionsgate saw a cheap film with a rising star which was well-received. It was an easy profit for them and helps build up their library as they are looking to be sold off. Vertical, having released last year's acclaimed The Order, is trying to build a filmmaker friendly reputation. Buying a non-commercial film with a high profile cast and a high profile director gives them more exposure and allows them to be more in the conversation for prestige filmmaking.
The film's financiers, however, are the money losers in both situations. Whether or not the distributors lost money doesn't really matter. Money losers are money losers and these films should be described as such.
And this is where it gets weird.
In the wake of Americana's opening we got two different articles about the film's box office. One from Deadline and one from IndieWire. Covering for the film, arguing that they weren't money losers for the reasons I myself just gave earlier. This weekend, as Eden just released, Deadline releases yet another article defending the film's performance.
This is too much coverage for these films that no one saw. Comparable films never get articles like this. So what's going on?
Here's my conspiracy theory. Sydney Sweeney is friends with Jeff Bezos. She attended his wedding and a few months ago there were heavily circulated rumors about her being the new Bond girl a franchise that Bezos unfortunately owns.
The media outlets that cover the entertainment industry: Variety, Deadline, Hollywood Reporter, and IndieWire are all owned by the same person: Jay Penske. Penske and Bezos run in the same circles, rich guy circles, and have attended philanthropic events at the same time. What I believe is happening is that Bezos is using his influence and connections for these outlets to write out positive headlines for Sweeney, due to her controversies, to create a more flattering image of her and her career.
It's odd, to say the least.
Love a good, low-stakes conspiracy theory, and it seems logical enough.
It's funny to think about how any given person 'makes it'. Not considering nepo-babies, there's presumably some combo of (luck), hussle, charisma/je-ne-sais-quoi, and talent. But what other machinations go on within the industry that promote one prospectice star over another? (A question that, uhg, hopefully no longer has weinstein-esque answers)
lol.
I don’t actually know how an industry decides to promote one star heavily. Sometimes it yields positive effects, Colin Farrell had this heavy push from the industry when he was in his 20s and he’s now a household name and an acclaimed actor. Austin Butler is also being heavily pushed now and he’s a great actor and gaining steam. But we also get Sam Worthington and Jai Courtney never taking off. I guess it’s “this look is in now” and they can fit movies that are of the current trend.
Doesn't just a celebrity's PR team arrange for articles like that all the time? I mean sometimes with outright sponsorship but often with an offer of an exclusive or something.
I don't think it takes Bezos to make that happen.
Aren’t film costs difficult to analyze because of all the accounting shenanigans production companies are able to get away with? I’ve heard these companies are able to find ways to write off the films as a loss for the financing company while none of the stakeholders actually lose money.
I also think film is a lot like venture capital where financiers are making many projects at an actual loss in service of finding a blockbuster. That makes the analysis more complex because films might be considered successful even if they lose money as long as they beat the expected return.
This might be a “two things can be true” situation where the stakeholders won despite a loss on paper.
“Creative accounting” only really happens backstage. Not the stuff that trades report, it’s in their own accounting sheets. Like how Order of the Phoenix or how Bohemian Rhapsody also lost money. It’s an odd thing where you want positive press of being a big hit but want the tax incentives of having a flop.
Not really the case here since the financials were reported well before their releases or premieres, and one of the companies don’t even exist anymore so there’s no incentive for this creative accounting.