A Big, Fat Windfall at the Box Office

At first, all they wanted was for their little movie to survive through the cinematic onslaught of Memorial Day. Four months and more than $57 million later, “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” has turned into Hollywood’s unlikely success story of the summer.

Without the benefit of lightsabers, car chases, special effects or marquee stars, the movie, which cost a mere $5 million to make, is on track to gross more than $100 million worldwide.

Its low-budget, grass-roots marketing campaign--pitched initially at Greek Americans nationwide--is almost laughable by current standards of the industry, in which mass-marketed mega-movies like “Spider-Man” and “Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones” open on thousands of screens in their first weekends and cost many millions to promote. Those films have grossed $404 million and $300 million, respectively, in the U.S. alone, leading the way for a record-breaking season at the box office.

But while some adult moviegoers despaired this summer about the hyped-up, dumbed-down state of Hollywood, “Greek Wedding” offered hope that small, character-driven films, powered primarily by word of mouth, could break through.

“There have been other indie hits, like ‘The Full Monty,’ ‘Blair Witch Project,’ these touchstone films that represent independent-film benchmarks,” said Paul Dergarabedian, president of Exhibitor Relations Co., a box-office tracking firm. “But this is in a class by itself, because it is a really low-budget film, it is a comedy, and it is out in the summer.”

Since it was released April 19, “Greek Wedding,” which was directed by Joel Zwick, has been steadily climbing the charts this month and has out-grossed many studio releases on a per-screen average. It is now the highest-grossing independently produced romantic comedy ever made, outpacing even “Four Weddings and a Funeral,” which in 1994 took in $52.7 million in domestic sales and launched Hugh Grant’s career in the U.S.

“I don’t know why it has hit this chord in America, other than we are all immigrants,” said actress Rita Wilson, who produced the movie through Playtone, the company she owns with her husband, Tom Hanks. “I remember a distributor in New York telling me early on: ‘This is just what the country needs right now. They just want to laugh and have a good time.’ ”

“Greek Wedding” wasn’t the only small movie to succeed this year; others include the racy Mexican film “Y Tu MamaTambien” and the Indian film “Monsoon Wedding.” The new quirky independent comedy “The Good Girl,” starring Jennifer Aniston, is doing strong business, and even “The Fast Runner,” a three-hour epic in the Inuit language about feuding brothers in the Arctic Circle, grossed $2.6 million playing in only 56 theaters nationwide.

Beyond the independents, a few of the big studios saw some success this year from their smaller films, such as Warner Bros.’ “Insomnia” and “The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood” and 20th Century Fox’s steamy “Unfaithful.” Each grossed more than $50 million domestically.

“What these movies have in common is a very strong individual filmmaker point of view, while the big studio movies are industrial commodities,” said Steve Gilula, president of distribution for Fox Searchlight, which released “The Good Girl.” “These movies are character-driven and about real people. And they are very, very relatable.”

The summer movie season, which began with the release of “Spider-Man” on May 3, is expected to surpass $3.8 billion in ticket sales by Labor Day, up 10% from last summer, according to Exhibitor Relations. That record-breaking number was fueled not only by colossal openings from “Spider-Man” and “Star Wars,” but by a mix of movies playing side by side in the nation’s megaplexes, said Jeff Blake, head of marketing and distribution for Sony Pictures, which released “Spider-Man” and leads the summer box office with $1.3 billion in ticket sales to date.

“Greek Wedding” showed that small movies can be moneymakers too. Proportionally, “Greek Wedding” will probably net more money for its distributor, producers and investors than either “Spider-Man” or “Star Wars” did--because the costs associated with the blockbusters’ production and marketing are so high, according to industry sources.

Stage-Show Roots

But “Greek Wedding” is more than a box-office smash. It has become a cultural phenomenon.

“What happened with ‘Greek Wedding’ was that every self-respecting Greek in the country showed up,” said Jim Gianopolus, co-chairman of 20th Century Fox, who is Greek. “But then the charm and the sweetness of the film spoke for itself. It is truly the box-office phenomenon of the year, without question.”

“My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” which is based on Nia Vardalos’ one-woman stage show, is about a young woman caught between pleasing her traditional Greek family and trying to find her identity as a modern American--including marrying a non-Greek. Despite tepid reviews from some critics, the film has become the talk of dinner parties, hair salons, cafes and retirement communities.

“Our demographic is anybody with a family that drives them crazy, or anybody who has ever had to plan a wedding, a funeral or a vacation,” said Vardalos, who wrote the screenplay and stars in the movie.

The movie, which co-stars “Sex and the City’s” John Corbett, has also become a favorite of the children of immigrants, such as Wilson, who is Greek on her mother’s side. Growing up, she identified strongly with feeling as if she was “Greek at home and American at school.” She approached Vardalos about producing the film immediately after seeing her show.

Audiences ranging from Armenian American retirees in Orange County to Mexican Americans in Los Angeles are turning up at sold-out shows, according to Vardalos, who says she was in a Montreal cafe when a Chinese family came up to her table.

“The girl said, ‘Oh my God, we are from Detroit and my mom is exactly like your dad,’ and the mom was behind her nodding her head and laughing,” Vardalos recalled.

But nobody, including Vardalos or the film’s distributor, IFC Films, expected the overwhelming response. Initially, studios showed some interest in the script, but none would sign a deal with an “unknown” like Vardalos as the star--one studio suggested replacing her with Sandra Bullock. Some studios wanted to change the ethnicity of the characters to Latino, Jewish or Italian. Wilson had to independently finance the film.

But Vardalos said the film’s success is not necessarily a textbook example of brilliant marketing.

“There was no secret trick” to it, she said. “We got lucky. You can’t manufacture word of mouth. You can’t pay people to tell their 10 cousins.”

“This was built from word of mouth and became a project of managing its success,” said Bob Berney, who oversaw the film’s distribution at IFC. “We kept joking about making it through Memorial Day and then Fourth of July, and now it’s Labor Day--the movie might make it to Christmas. We can barely keep up” with requests for prints.

Small Beginnings

IFC’s approach to releasing the film was cautious. It began small, at 103 theaters. Over four months it built up to more than 1,300 theaters in 50 cities. By contrast, “Spider-Man” opened on 7,500 screens on its first weekend.

Though blockbusters’ box-office grosses typically drop sharply in their second weekend--ticket sales for the heavily marketed “XXX,” for example, fell 48% after its opening weekend--”Greek Wedding” shot up 85% in its fourth month out.

It has been climbing up the list of top 10 films, is currently No. 6 and is expected to break $60 million domestically this weekend.

But Berney is still being cautious, not wanting to distribute the film too wide, noting that its funny romantic overtones play well to packed movie houses.

IFC has spent only $15 million on marketing--compared with the average of $50 million a major studio will spend for a blockbuster. Berney knew they had to initially zero in on their core audience--the Greek community, women and older moviegoers. IFC made only spot television buys on such shows as “Oprah” and “Regis” and the cable network “Lifetime” to target the female audience.

Paula Silver, whose company Beyond the Box was hired to handle the grass-roots marketing for the film, said they decided to approach the Greek community first.

Silver, the former president of marketing for Columbia Pictures, initially began with $1.2 million to plug the film. She started at ground level in March at the annual Greek Folk Dance Festival, in Spokane, Wash. At the festival she handed out 1,000 T-shirts and got up on a stage to tell the crowd about the movie.

In Chicago, Silver got the makers of Windex--a product featured prominently in the film--to give money to the Hellenic Museum. The museum, in turn, hosted a party with prominent Greeks in Chicago, along with Second City Theater, of which Vardalos had been a member. Silver also organized an e-mail network to get Greek Americans out to see the film on its first weekend.

At Greek parades around the nation they threw out T-shirts to the crowds and then showed a looped “Greek Wedding” trailer at pubs, where revelers finished the day.

Once the Greek community got behind the film, others did too. And once women began seeing it, they started dragging their husbands to the theater with them, Vardalos said.

“No matter where a film comes from, if there is a gap for a certain audience, they will go,” said Berney, who is now the president of New Market Films, another independent distributor.

At Le Petit Greek restaurant in Los Angeles, where Vardalos is a regular, manager Tomy Maheras said customers rave about the movie and even comment on some of the more memorable moments, like “the spitting scene” and “the Windex situation.”

“I see a couple hundred people a day, and people come in and talk about it on their own,” he said. “I was surprised that people who are not Greek found it funny also. And I have sent a good 30 people to see it.”

It is also the talk of the Palmia senior community in Mission Viejo. While playing chess in the community room, residents raved about the movie, said resident Alice Ajamian. She went with a group of female friends and has told relatives in Wisconsin to go see it.

In a way, “Greek Wedding,” and “Monsoon Wedding” hark back to Hollywood classics like the screwball comedies of the 1930s or the more conventional 1950s hits like “Father of the Bride.”

“That is the one movie all the old ladies and senior citizens went to. It brings back memories if you are from a family that is Italian or Armenian or Jewish,” said Ajamian, who is Armenian. “I think that is what [the studios] should do more of instead of these bang-bang and sex things. I like the old movies they used to do years ago. They don’t make those kind of movies anymore.”

She’s right, for the most part. Despite the success of “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” audiences can expect as many sequels and adrenaline-fueled action films next summer as this, including Warner Bros.’ “The Matrix Reloaded,” Fox’s “X Men 2,” Sony’s “Charlie’s Angels 2” and Universal’s sequel to “The Fast and the Furious.”

“When the audience displays less keen interest in the franchises, then we certainly won’t be doing it in this industry,” said Marc Shmuger, vice chairman of Universal Pictures.

And inevitably, this being Hollywood, some are looking to turn “Greek Wedding” into a kind of mini-franchise of its own.

Offers for a sequel, a board game and a television show have come rushing in. Vardalos said she has passed on all so far.

But because of the movie’s success, Vardalos said, some studio executives are finally considering that perhaps “there are other stories to be told and other leads to be cast.”