A24’s Tony Turns a Tiny Start Into a $5 Million Weekend
The Anthony Bourdain biopic jumped from specialty heat to a seventh-place box office finish. For A24, it is another summer win built on expansion, not brute force.
A24’s Tony earned $5 million from 1,652 screens and landed in seventh place on the weekend box office chart, Yahoo Entertainment reported on August 23. The Anthony Bourdain biopic opened on August 7 in only six theaters, then widened after two strong specialty weekends. That is the part film readers should watch: Tony did not arrive as a pre-sold studio machine. It moved from New York and Los Angeles heat to a real national footprint, and it did so while several other indie releases struggled to turn attention into ticket sales.
A24 Turns Six Theaters Into a National Play
Deadline reported that Tony began with $349,000 from six theaters in New York and Los Angeles, good for a per-screen average of about $58,000. The outlet also reported sold-out shows in both markets across that first weekend.
That is the old specialty model working as intended: start small, let the audience prove the case, then spend the next weekends asking how far the movie can travel. IndieWire reported that in its second weekend, Tony made $741,751 from 37 locations, for a $20,047 average, bringing it to roughly $1.268 million at that point.
By the weekend Yahoo Entertainment covered on August 23, the film had reached 1,652 screens and $5 million for the frame. Its total stood at $6.6 million since release, according to the same report.
Those numbers do not make Tony a blockbuster. They make it something more useful for this corner of the business: a movie that found oxygen after opening small. A24 has built plenty of its identity on that skill, but it still matters when the trick works.
Photo: Lyn Fairly Media · CC BY 3.0 · source
Dominic Sessa’s Bourdain Film Had a Clear Hook
Tony centers on Anthony Bourdain’s time working in Provincetown, where the film says he found his love of cooking. Deadline described Matt Johnson’s film as imagining the summer when a 19-year-old Bourdain found that pull while working in a seaside kitchen.
Dominic Sessa stars as Bourdain. Yahoo Entertainment noted that Sessa had drawn critical notice for The Holdovers, and listed Emilia Jones, Dagmara Domińczyk, Leo Woodall, and Antonio Banderas among the cast. Deadline listed Stavros Halkias and Banderas as part of the ensemble, with Banderas playing Bourdain’s mentor.
There is obvious commercial danger in a film like this. Bourdain was not just a subject with a career. He was a voice: funny, impatient, curious, wounded on the page and on camera in ways people still remember. Yahoo Entertainment noted his food and travel shows and Kitchen Confidential, and reported that he died in 2018.
