‘Bros’ Bombs at Box Office
First major, mainstream gay rom-com starring Billy Eichner stumbles out of gate
LGBTQ+ romances are commonplace on screens large and small.
The indie film world teems with gay and lesbian love stories, as does the streaming landscape.
“Bros” is still a different kind of movie for Hollywood. And, based on the initial reception, mainstream audiences aren’t eager to see a rom-com aimed directly at the LGBTQ+ community.
“Bros,” a smart, sophisticated love story starring Billy Eichner, bombed at the box office. The film will earn roughly $4.75 million on more than 3,000 screens for its opening weekend, according to the far-Left Deadline.com.
That puts the film in fourth place behind “Smile,” “Don’t Worry Darling” and “The Women King” – the latter two in their second and third weeks of release, respectively. “Bros” under-performed in the black community (just 6 percent of the total audience) and in the heartland, according to Deadline.
“Bros” boasted plenty of advantages over most rom-coms.
The film’s director, Nicholas Stoller, is well-versed in comedic work (“Forgetting Sarah Marshall,” “Neighbors”). Co-producer Judd Apatow previously delivered hits like “Knocked Up,” “The Big Sick” and “Trainwreck.”
Eichner, who stars in the film and co-wrote the script, lassoed some of Hollywood’s biggest names to help promote the film, including Jack Black and Paul Rudd.
Billy Eichner has returned to the streets, this time with actor Jack Black, to promote his upcoming romantic comedy “Bros,” out in theaters Sept. 30. https://t.co/3CxxLC9nEa
— TheWrap (@TheWrap) September 26, 2022
Plus, “Bros” is smart, sophisticated and brimming with rom-com essentials – colorful supporting players, a strong resolution and credible second act conflicts.
The media gave the film plenty of attention, routinely mentioning its historic nature.
It still delivered horrible numbers for a mainstream release.
Why?
The film’s content may be partly to blame. Most rom-coms don’t deliver hardcore sex scenes, something “Bros” does repeatedly. Eichner’s social media presence is combative, to say the least. His hard-Left politics could have chased some viewers away.
WARNING: ADULT LANGUAGE
FYI. pic.twitter.com/KLu0lka9Sl
— billy eichner (@billyeichner) February 20, 2019
The film’s subplots may also hurt repeat business. The film takes shots at Presidents Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump, and gives a brief shout out to progressive darling Stacey Abrams.
It’s also possible audiences are wary of the culture wars and didn’t want their weekend escapism to remind them of our tribal times.
The film features scenes sure to alarm those who decry “grooming” tactics at the grade school level.
Hollywood, for all its progressive virtue signaling, can be unabashedly conservative when it comes to risk mitigation. The failure of “Bros” to draw a crowd won’t go unnoticed in Tinsel Town.
It’s interesting how people blame straight white men for this movie doing poorly. Are straight white men preventing other people from seeing the movie? No? Then how is it their fault? Are straight white men the intended audience of the movie? No? Then why are they at fault for not watching it? This is like blaming straight white men for the failure of the WNBA. If every feminist in the US bought season tickets to the WNBA, they’d make more money than the NBA. Similarly, if everyone who claimed to be allies of gays watched this movie it would do great. Why is it the fault of people who the movie is specifically not made for?
Its truly a mystery why a movie full of progressive politics and hardcore gay sex bombed with 99.99% of Americans.
So many refreshing, intelligent, nuanced, thoughtful, insightful comments full of well-articulated points and lucid critiques on this page! Here I thought this website would be the weird ramblings of a bunch of chinless, mediocre white men who have aged past their relevance and finally look around to see they cant understand a world passing them by. What a pleasant surprise! I was so wrong. I am better off seeing such amazing commentary. Thank you all for being such a contribution, such an asset to the world we live in AND the world I get to raise my children in! Such a delight.
Ah yes, Rom-Com movies. Whenever I think of them, I think of hardcore gay sex and “butt-rigs.’ To say that liberals are living in an alternate reality is an understatement.
There is no hard-core sex – meaning outright pornography – in this movie. And there are no ‘butt rigs’. Have you even seen this movie? Why do you keep returning to this thread? Your interest LOL is raising MY interest…..
The world hasn’t passed them (or me) by. I just choose not to go to a movie that doesn’t remotely appeal to me. As a rule I don’t like any rom-com of any flavor. So your overly cute and self aggrandizing post is really what is irrelevant in this conversation.
People don’t like revolting, unnatural nonsense being forced upon them. This will never be normalized, you’re just going to have to deal with it
I’m assuming this is sarcasm, if not, feel free to correct me.
If so, here’s a translation for anyone who doesn’t speak leftist:
“I have no rebuttal to any of the valid points made by the commenters on this piece, so instead of engaging in honest debate, I’ll just throw around some insults.”
We laugh at people like you.
After seeing the commercials ..this obviously wasn’t a movie that was appealing to most movie goer’s.
This would’ve had poor ratings as a made for TV movie, someone wasted a lot of money putting this project together.
I saw it tonight with a heterosexual female friend and we both loved it. Then I saw that it has a 91% critics score and a 93% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes so far. Regardless of whether it’s viewed as being geared toward too narrow of a potential audience, I believe word of mouth will help turn up ticket sales and will help them surpass their $22 million budget in the coming weeks and then some.
HOMOSEXUALITY is DISGUSTING to black people. We don’t like it, don’t support it and try their best to ignore it when it pops up Except lesbians , we tolerate them on Pornhub but that’s it!
Its ok Keith, no shame in being on the DL.
It is just not cold enough in Miami and the cities 4 of Texas and San Diego for cisgender gay men to go to a movie theater to watch any movie.
I saw it, it was good
Yeah, no.
Prince of the airwaves, your time is short!!
Just a little back of an envelope calculating, (not really, I used my phone) but $4,750,000 in ticket sales at 3,000 locations averages less than $1600 in ticket sales per theater. I don’t know what ticket prices are these days, but if we assume $8, (my local theater is about $12) that means about 200 tickets sold. Per theater. For the WEEKEND. I don’t know how many showings in a weekend, but if we assume three on Friday, three on Saturday, and two on Sunday for a total of 8, that means 25 fannies in seats on average, (Note: only about 17 fannies at $12 per ticket, and even fewer if there are more showings) . Even in a small theater, that’ a LOT of empty chairs.
After reading Eichner’s social media comments, I could not be happier to see this movie bomb.
I think audiences are weary of devicive “entertainment,” not wary. Well, maybe we’re both. Regardless, I wouldn’t see this garbage if you paid me.
I think you mean “divisive”. Womp womp.
Oh, no! A typo! Call the Police!
“Don’t stand! Don’t stand! Don’t stand so close to me!”
Dang it! Not again!
It really was not garbage. It was a fun movie. Unfortunately it would t connect with close minded individuals.
When you tailor your product to a niche market, expecting widespread success seems a bit…um…optimistic…to me.
There’s nothing wrong with tailoring a product (any type of product) to appeal to a specific market, but expecting the people to whom the product is NOT tailored to embrace it, acting surprised when they don’t, and (as is likely the next step) accusing them of bigotry because they didn’t choose the product that wasn’t made for them in the first place, is kind of silly.
Do manufacturers of baseball gloves for left handed players excoriate the right handed players for not buying their products?
Correct. These folks have raised their expectations to a ridiculous level by filling TV shows and commercials with an over-representative percentage of interracial gay couples. So they don’t grasp the true !limit of the appeal of this garbage to the average viewer.
Excelent and well thought comment. I agree 100%. Cheers!
Jack Black looks like he doesn’t want to be around Billy Eichner.
Hard core gay sex and pedophilia. That’s what I’m looking for in a rom com. Not. And I should pay for this? I wouldn’t watch it if you paid me $1000.
Funny how you always forget to mention all the STRAIGHT people when you use the word pedophiles straight teachers molesting children straight guys raping young girls you need to watch ABC to catch a predator to see all straight guys meeting 13 yrs old.A pedo is not str8 or gay they are pedos!!
Uh, girl… or is it dude? Just about nobody here was all that interested in seeing Cuties either. Also, some pedos are into little girls, some are into little boys, and some are into both. I’d say straight, , and bi as adjectives apply as much to pedos as to any other kind of pervert.
(P.S. I’m not sure why the word “gay” isn’t in my post—maybe I missed a tag or something—but that’s what’s supposed to be in that empty space behind that second comma there.)
You should ask your spouse if you even have one, what sex is even about because you obviously have no clue. A rom com can be much more than bigotry closed minded brain can comprehend.
If being a bigot gets me Romcoms that don’t involve hard-core sex, blatant politics, and the sexualization of kids then sign me up. I want to watch a Romcom to laugh, not feel uncomfortable and icky.
The “movie” is a repugnant POS. That’s why it failed.
Ah, so this box office office bomb is another one of those diverse, inclusive, equitable bits of crapola we’re too “bigoted” to understand because unlike you wokesters, we’ve never been “open-minded” enough for our brains to go tumbling out of our skulls the way yours obviously have.
Are you serious? Are you 80? Where was the pedophilia in this movie. The movie was actually very funny and the writing was fun with sharp witted innuendo’s. The cast was fun and it was cool most of the beast was LGBTQ!
Only drawback was the the over kill on promotion and while Billy was good at times, he didn’t let the other cast develops their characters.
Because I don’t wanna see homosexuality. It’s simple to me.
Hey Rusty, are you from Portland?
The name’s a King Of The Hill reference, you busy-body narc, and I chose it exactly because of morality police like you, Michele.
Exactly. Im glad that pos movie bombed!!! Awesome.
This is a movie about very attractive shirtless men, so we understand if you’re intimidated. Nobody is going strong arm you into the theater. Unless you’re into that type of thing.
This is the morality police. Get off this website