Good newsThree-Hour Holmes Documentary Earns More in Second Weekend Than on Its Opening
A24’s You Can See Everything took an estimated $19.5 million in its second weekend, up from $15.6 million on opening, and has made $45.1 million in North America against a $7 million production cost.
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A three-hour documentary made more money in its second weekend than in its first, a rare thing for any film. A24’s Elizabeth Holmes documentary, You Can See Everything, collected an estimated $19.5 million from 2,655 North American theaters, Variety reports. That is up from $15.6 million on its opening weekend, and it brings the total to $45.1 million. The figures are Sunday estimates; final numbers follow on Monday.
How the platform release worked
The film, directed by Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim, opened in 855 theaters, which Variety says was the best start for a non-musical documentary in 20 years. Deadline reports that A24 planned to open in fewer than 1,000 theaters, generate sellouts and buzz, and then go wide. This weekend it added about 1,800 theaters.
| Weekend | Theaters | Estimated gross |
|---|---|---|
| Opening | 855 | $15.6 million |
| Second | 2,655 | $19.5 million |
| Total to date | $45.1 million |
The result is more striking because a second weekend usually falls. Deadline notes that percentage jumps in a second frame are common when a film expands, but a second weekend that beats the opening in dollars is rare.
What it cost, and who it beat
The box office figures are domestic, meaning the United States and Canada. Variety does not give an international total for the documentary, and the sources do not say what share of the $45.1 million A24 keeps after theaters take their cut.
Variety says the film was produced for $7 million, so it has already returned more than six times its cost at the North American box office. Deadline reports that a distribution head at a rival company said the industry should use this kind of limited start more often to build anticipation.
It finished a close second to a new studio release. Warner Bros. and DC’s Clayface opened at No. 1 with an estimated $24 million from 3,458 theaters, with a $43 million global start. Variety reports that Clayface cost $44 million to produce, near the low end of studio expectations for its opening, and holds an A minus grade from audiences polled by CinemaScore.
Elsewhere in the top three, Laika’s stop-motion Wildwood debuted at No. 3 with about $11 million, Variety says, above projections of $6 million to $8 million. Variety calls it a promising start for original animation, which has had a hard time since the pandemic, helped by a perfect score on Rotten Tomatoes and an A from CinemaScore audiences.
Why people are going
Deadline points to word of mouth and to a flood of memes about the film online as free marketing. Paul Dergarabedian of Rentrak told Variety that opening in 855 theaters let the film build momentum before it went much wider, and called a documentary’s second-weekend rise remarkable.
Awards forecasters, Variety says, now think it could become the first documentary to earn a best picture Oscar nomination. That is a prediction, not a result, and the Academy’s voting is months away.
What to watch next
The film’s next test is its third weekend, when the novelty of the wide release fades and the sellouts of the first run are a memory. If it holds, a $7 million documentary will have made far more than its cost while bigger films struggle. Variety notes, for example, that DC’s Supergirl earned $126 million against a $170 million budget.
