The North American rights to the Andrew Scott vehicle have been secured, the fall release is set, and quite frankly, the holiday season as we know it has been put on notice.
I was picking at a remarkably aggressive endive salad at the Polo Lounge last Tuesday when my Apple Watch vibrated with the only theatrical distribution news that actually matters this quarter: Focus Features has acquired the North American and Latin American rights to Simon Stone’s ‘Elsinore’. While the rest of the country was busying itself with whatever mundane domestic crises currently occupy the middle class, I was already texting my publicist to secure opening-weekend tickets for an Andrew Scott vehicle that will, quite frankly, put the American holiday season on notice.
Let us be perfectly clear about the sheer hostility of what Focus Features is doing here. By setting a limited launch for November 20 before expanding nationwide over Thanksgiving, the studio is throwing a lifeline to those of us who would rather watch a prestige European psychological drama than pretend to care about our cousins’ mortgages. Amid a slate of tedious franchise bloat, the decision to drop a devastating theatrical feature right into the middle of the most forced familial gathering of the calendar is a masterstroke of civic sabotage.
I spoke to a source close to the production—well, I say "spoke," we locked eyes knowingly across the valet stand at Soho House—and the strategy is brutally apparent. They know exactly what they are doing to your Thursday dinner plans.
Our proprietary tracking showed a massive, highly motivated demographic of coastal residents who need a credible excuse to leave their childhood homes immediately after the turkey is carved. Expanding an intense Andrew Scott feature right as the political arguments start over dessert isn't just a release strategy, it is a public health initiative.
We must also spare a thought for the true martyrs of this deal: the Studiocanal executives who had to part with the domestic rights. Studiocanal, which handles global sales, will bravely retain the feature in their home markets of the UK, France, Germany, Poland, and Benelux. I shared a sea bass with a Studiocanal rep at Cannes last year, and I can tell you the emotional toll of carving up global territories is profound. To hand over the Latin American rights while clinging desperately to Italy—which, my sources confirm, will be handled by Lucky Red—requires a level of corporate fortitude that your average consumer simply cannot comprehend.
The sheer mechanics of the Studiocanal retention cannot be overstated. Do you know what it is like to negotiate theatrical windows for the Benelux region? I do, because I was trapped in a luxury SUV with a Belgian sales agent for forty-five minutes during TIFF.
Retaining the Polish and German markets was a matter of sheer survival for us. We knew Focus Features was going to weaponize the North American Thanksgiving window, but we needed to ensure that European audiences could also leverage this film to avoid their own respective winter solstice obligations.
As for the film itself, the buzz has been deafening since before a single frame was shot. Simon Stone is directing, which automatically means the premiere will be unbearable in the best possible way. And then there is Andrew Scott. Make no mistake, the sheer volume of think-pieces surrounding his performance is already exhausting me, and I am the one generating them. I have preemptively decided that anyone who waits until the December expansion to see this film is fundamentally unserious about cinema and probably buys their olive oil at a grocery store.
The reps hammered out this deal so that we, the cultural vanguard, might have something to talk about besides whatever it is regular people discuss—inflation, I assume. So when November 20 arrives, I will not be expressing gratitude or passing the cranberry sauce. I will be sitting in a darkened theater in Los Angeles, observing the limited launch exactly as the studio intended, entirely confident that my ticket purchase makes me a better person than you.