The future is looking bleak for Hollywood studios.
The Hollywood Reporter revealed this week that winter box office takings had fallen to “alarming lows” as customers shunned the cinema following months of underwhelming releases.
In fact, the figures are so bad that they amount to the worst January performance outside of the COVID years in the 21st century.
THR explained:
Domestic box office revenue year-to-date of $581.2 million is running 43 percent behind the average haul during the same time period in 2016-19, when movie ticket sales clocked in as high as $1.08 billion, according to data provided by Comscore for Jan. 1-Feb. 4.
Of that, January clocked in at $513.6 million, compared to $599 million in 2023 (a breakout hit last year was M3GAN, with more than $83 million in ticket sales domestically, while Avatar: The Way of Water contributed more than $210 million)….
