Sleepless in Hollywood: Tales From the New Abnormal in the Movie Business Read Online Free Page A

now tipsy, padded into the lobby, greeting flocks of other women and girls, until we found ourselves in a theater filled with—hallelujah, is this happening?!—“event-movie” electricity. Amid the raucous groups of girls (apparently we weren’t the only ones who had this “get drunk with your GFs and go see Bridesmaids” idea) were an amazing number of guys—almost half the theater. In delighted shock, we smiled and waved to them. “We love you, Bridesmaids guys!”
    By Monday morning (May 17, 2011) the number was $24.5 million, $10 million more than was predicted. The fact that the numbers kept going up over the weekend meant that the word of mouth was great. Women had a hit. We claimed this as ours. We gave thanks that night that a genre had possibly survived.
    This meant something big.
    When an inexpensive ($32.5 million) original movie starring barely known women from television, whose stillborn death was predicted by all, survives and has legs in the hostile concrete jungle of noisy sequels and reboots, it is a cause célèbre. We felt this way about The Help, The Town, The Fighter and Black Swan, and about Argo and The Silver Linings Playbook this past year. We just want more original movies made because they are good. Because they are funny or smart and are being made by talented people. Where are they? Why are they so rare?
    Why do movies like the first Hangover and Bridesmaids so surprise the studios? They are both classic high-concept ideas, which was the coin of the realm of the Old Abnormal. The Hangover is about four best friends at a bachelor party who get wasted and lost in Las Vegas and wake up in a hotel room with Mike Tyson’s tiger and no groom. They have to find him and get him back in time for his wedding. It was something that would have sold in a comedypitch by two writers in baseball caps. But now, in the New Abnormal, these movies that get made for under $40 million with no stars are the counterexamples, what the industry calls “lightning in a bottle.” When they work, it seems like magic. But it’s not magic. These writer-created original movies are simply funny. Finding them requires judgment, intensive script development, discerning writer and director choices and good casting—craft, in other words. Then unknown, the stars of The Hangover were paid under a million dollars for the first movie. Now each star can get a movie green-lit on his own and is getting $15 million for The Hangover Part III.
    On the Monday morning after the astonishing first weekend of Bridesmaids ( Hangover ’s twin sister—four unknown women in a high-concept comedy), everybody was knocked on their collective asses, and as is common with paradigm shifts, many things happened.
    The first thing that happened was that Kristen Wiig became a star.
    Second, Melissa McCarthy, of CBS’s Mike and Molly, who gave a breakout performance in the movie, became its second new star and is now toplining comedies.
    Third, chick flicks were getting a second look all over town.
    Fourth, 50,000 R-rated female buddy comedies showed up on managers’ desks. However, it was a temporary reprieve. Much to our consternation, it did not presage a resurgence of chick flicks, romantic comedies, or even four-women buddy comedies. The success seemed to affect only the stars.
    When an original comedy like The Hangover, a great idea with no preawareness and no huge stars, works so well—becoming a wildly successful sleeper hit that then spawns a sequel and perhaps a franchise—it could create a model that allows for other ideas like Bridesmaids to get made. And then movies like Bridesmaids allow for crazy, funny, broad movies to get a second look. I wentto discuss this thought with pal Kevin Goetz, who had warned me of the industry’s low expectations for the opening weekend of Bridesmaids.
    We sat down to lunch at the South Beverly Grill, which has the best crab cakes in town. I wanted to razz him a little about Bridesmaids, but I also