You might think winning an Oscar will bring studios, actors and directors a big payday but that's not exactly true. Paul Dergarabedian, Senior Media Analyst at Rentrak (RENT) says the idea of an Oscar ‘bounce’ or bump is exaggerated. “There’s an assumption that movies get a boost at the box office or on-demand or that the actors and actresses that win that their careers take off in a way they’ve never had before.” Dergarabedian says it’s not the Oscar win that predicates success but rather the choices and roles the actor makes after winning that will ultimately determine where their career ends up.
The real key for studios is capitalizing on the nomination process. “At the point of the nominations, which are several weeks before the Oscar telecast, that’s when they really get the bump,” says Dergarabedian. Studios carefully and meticulously plan and develop marketing strategies to take advantage of the anticipated nomination buzz.
Take for instance, best picture nominee “American Sniper”. “Warner Bros. waited until the day after the nominations and added about 3,500 theaters to the four theaters it was playing in for the first three weeks. Suddenly, that movie made $89 million in that opening weekend and became a box office juggernaut,” says Dergarabedian. “American Sniper” went on to gross over $300 million, with a whopping 99% of its earnings coming after the movie was nominated according to data from Rentrak. That is enough to out gross more than double all the other films combined.
An Oscar nomination is especially important for smaller films. “‘The Imitation Game’, ‘Whiplash’ and some of the smaller titles that might not otherwise have garnered any more attention and would have sort have been dead in the water in terms of their box office, they do get a boost at the time of the nominations,” says Dergarabedian. The Weinstein Company’s, “The Imitation Game” grossed 47% of its $80 Million box office earnings after being nominated. Fellow best picture nominee, Paramount Pictures’ “Selma” made 66% of its nearly $50 million in the weeks after it was selected.
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Dergarabedian says by the time the red carpet rolls out in Hollywood on Sunday “most of these films are played out, so to speak, in theaters.” The picture that wins the Oscar will have to most likely look to other mediums to generate revenue. “Any of these films, if they win, will get a nice boost whether they’re on the home screen or video on demand platform. Let’s say ‘Birdman’ wins, it’s on the various VOD platforms. A lot of people are going to want to see that movie that may have been on the fence about it,” Dergarabedian says.