On Thursday night, “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour” debuted in theaters in America and Canada. It opened worldwide in 90 countries on Friday. The concert film documents the North American leg of her unimaginably successful “Eras” tour.
Even before Thursday’s debut, the movie had generated $100 million in advanced ticket sales. To give you some idea of how remarkable that is, consider the following:
The current (not for long) highest-grossing concert movie of all time is “Michael Jackson: This Is It” (2009). That concert film generated a total of $261 million during its entire run. So even before actually opening, Taylor’s movie has generated 40% of the all-time record number.
Another fun fact: With $100 million in advanced sales, Taylor has already bumped “Justin Bieber: Never Say Never” (2011) from second to third place. Justin’s movie’s total gross was $99 million total revenue.
Taylor’s movie is projected to generate another $75 million in day-of tickets and international tickets, for a total of $175 million in advanced + first weekend sales. Conservatively, the movie is expected to generate $300-400 million in revenue. The budget was just $15 million.
These numbers beg an obvious question:
How much will Taylor Swift make off the movie’s ticket sales?
(Photo by John Shearer/Getty Images for TAS)
Unprecedented Revenue Share
I spent some time digging into this question today, speaking with a few industry sources. The answer was stunning. When negotiating with AMC to be the film’s exclusive distributor, Taylor Swift struck an absolutely unprecedented revenue sharing deal.
My sources told me that Taylor is getting 50% of first dollar gross on all North American ticket sales. First dollar gross means for every dollar earned by theaters in Canada and America, before any costs, Taylor gets a 50% cut. So if the movie generates $200 million in North America, Taylor will get $100 million. In fact, she’s likely already earned around $50 million from the $100 million advanced ticket sales.
Why is 50% unprecedented? It might literally might be unprecedented, as in it’s never happened. Even tycoons like Steven Spielberg do not get anywhere near 50% first dollar gross of their films.
Consider this recent example:
Let’s jump back to the release of “Top Gun: Maverick” in the summer of 2022. Tom Cruise, arguably the biggest movie star in the world, spent around 30 years declining to even consider a sequel to his 1986 star-making classic. In order to get him on board, the production company behind the project had to make a big, big, big offer. An offer he couldn’t refuse. That offer was 10% of first dollar gross. Tom went on to make $113 million thanks to that 10% cut when the movie became a billion-dollar blockbuster.
Taylor’s cut of foreign revenue is more difficult to pin-down. It very well may still be 50%, but my sources couldn’t be sure.
Let’s say Taylor is getting 50% of foreign revenue, and let’s say her movie ends up generating $400 million worldwide. If that happens, Taylor’s cut will be…
$200 million
One final point: A Variety article says Taylor’s cut is 57% of gross revenue:
“Swift’s camp will receive roughly 57% of ticket sales, with theaters keeping the remaining revenues and AMC taking a small distribution fee.“
For what it’s worth, my sources told me that 57% is not correct and AMC is taking much more than a “small distribution fee.”
At a certain point we’re talking about rounding errors in comparison to the amount of money Taylor is going to earn from the actual “Eras” concert. The concert is on pace to generate $2 billion in gross revenue from all sources (ticket sales, merchandise, concessions). When you combine her movie ticket revenue and eventual final concert total revenue, it’s possible we’ll see Taylor Swift’s net worth breach billionaire status, from its current $800 million.
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