Well, that’s didn’t take long – after just four days in the box office, Billy Eichner has already blamed the failure of his new gay romcom Bros on “homophobia” from “straight people”.
Universal Pictures’ Bros bombed at the box office this weekend, earning only $4.8 million dollars in its premiere against a $22 million dollar production budget.
The film was trounced by its fellow debut, Paramount Pictures’ horror film Smile, which took first place with a pull of $22 million.
Bros also fell behind Warner Bros.’ Don’t Worry Darling, which made $7.3 million in its second weekend, as well as Sony’s The Woman King which did 7 million in its third weekend.
It was even almost almost beat by Disney’s re-release of 2009’s Avatar, which has now been in theaters for over two weeks.
Eichner – who many may remember from either his brief role in Parks and Rec, voicing Timon in Disney’s live-action remake of The Lion King, or wishing for “Trump and all MAGA lunatics to burn in Hell” – didn’t take the news very well.
Taking to Twitter on October 2nd, the actor passed the buck on his film’s failure on to what he accuses is widespread bigotry from straight people.
“Last night I snuck in and sat in the back of a sold-out theater playing BROS in LA,” opened Eichner on the topic. “The audience howled with laughter from start to finish, burst into applause at the end, and some were wiping away tears as they walked out. It was truly magical. Really. I am VERY proud of this movie.””
“Rolling Stone already has BROS on the list of the best comedies of the 21st century,” he continued, rolling into full-on defense mode. “What’s also true is that at one point a theater chain called Universal and said they were pulling the trailer because of the gay content. (Uni convinced them not to). America, fuck yeah, etc etc.”
Turning to the fact that his film absolutely failed to find any sort of audience, Eichner then accused, “That’s just the world we live in, unfortunately. Even with glowing reviews, great Rotten Tomatoes scores, an A CinemaScore etc, straight people, especially in certain parts of the country, just didn’t show up for Bros.”
“And that’s disappointing but it is what it is,” he added.
Finally, Eichner concluded his thread by exclaiming, “Everyone who ISN’T a homophobic weirdo should go see BROS tonight!”
“You will have a blast!” he concluded. “And it *is* special and uniquely powerful to see this particular story on a big screen, esp for queer folks who don’t get this opportunity often. I love this movie so much. GO BROS!!!”
Of course, it wasn’t that long ago when Eichner was begging the audience at the MTV Video Music Awards to come out and support what he has been calling the “first gay romantic comedy by a major studio in the last 100 years.”
Turns out, being guilted into watching a movie isn’t an effective marketing strategy.
Eichner joins a growing list of Hollywood stars who attempt to shame moviegoers into supporting their films with politically-charged rhetoric.
Viola Davis stated in a recent interview with Canadian entertainment talk show eTalk that audiences who don’t see The Woman King, a film that revises history in an attempt to turn violent African slavers into heroes, are supporting the narrative that black women can’t lead the box office globally.
“Hollywood is interested in green so if you don’t come to see it then you’re sending a message that black women cannot lead the box office globally,” Davis said at the time.
The two-time Suicide Squad star continued, “If you want to normalize it, come see the same way you would Black Panther, Iron Man, Spider-Man, any other movie that doesn’t have any of us in it, or one or two of us in it.”
Elizabeth Banks is another star who failed to find box office success by going down this path.
Her 2019 woke reboot of Charlie’s Angels was a major money loser for Sony, even after Banks attempted to shame audiences into watching Charlie’s Angels by claiming that “if this movie doesn’t make money it reinforces a stereotype in Hollywood that men don’t go see women do action movies.”
“They’ll go and see a comic book movie with Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel because that’s a male genre,” she said.
As a side note to top it all off, the month of September was a historically bad month for Hollywood as not a single film released last month managed to pull over $20 million in its opening weekend, marking the first time since 9/11 that Hollywood has experienced such a drought.
