Success of 'Bridesmaids' dispels some Hollywood myths

By Sarah Sluis

In many ways, Bridesmaids is a pretty typical movie. It bears the hallmarks of the comedies from producer Judd Apatow: a reliance on improv, an R-rating, and grounding in realism. But there's one thing that's different about Bridesmaids: women. To get a sense of how much Bridesmaids ruffles the status quo of Hollywood, one need only look at the numbers. The Kristen Wiig-starrer was originally predicted to earn in the high teen millions. After earning $7.8 million on Friday, THR posted an updated weekend prediction of $21.5 million. When the Monday estimates came in, Variety and THR both reported numbers in the $24.6 million range--much better than expected. Then the Monday actuals came in. The little comedy that could brought in $26.2 million. All told, the film earned 50% more than expected.

Occasionally, a movie will confound tracking, and it's often one that appeals to an audience that doesn't attend movies frequently. Bridesmaids had great reviews from critics and positive word-of-mouth, but insiders didn't have confidence that these indicators would lead to an overflowing box office. Bridesmaids led to a lot of chatter and enthusiastic recommendations in social networks. It was also a "group" movie, and the extra friend or boyfriend people dragged along probably added to the overperformance.

Hollywood is often criticized for not releasing enough movies that appeal to women, star women, and that really flesh out their characters. The success of Bridesmaids also shows that Hollywood has lacked the "sensors" to find the type of people who were excited about this kind of film. Insiders underestimated the support the film would get not only from a female audience, but a male one: 33% of the audience was male, refuting the industry adage that women will go to see a movie starring men but men won't see a movie starring women.

Bridesmaids' performance will undoubtedly inspire a number of female-driven comedies. Stale, packaged romantic comedies, with few exceptions, have been doing dismally at the box office, yet somehow these movies still get a green light. Bridesmaids also has something in common with 2006's surprise hit The Devil Wears Prada--it was a comedy about women that featured romance as an insignificant subplot.

Some Bridesmaids spinoffs might not get the entire message. I'm a little skeptical of the new Anna Faris vehicle, for example, What's Your Number?, which was billed as a "new kind of comedy" in a New Yorker profile of Faris. It's "raunchy" (Faris' character fears she has slept with too many men and revisits all her exes and one-night stands), but it also reads as a typical romantic comedy. The trailer makes it clear that the audience can count on the unfolding of a particularly painful, trite clich, that of "the Mr. Right who was right in front of you all along." It's the kind of thing that makes the audience roll their eyes in frustration.

Wiig's career should take off now that Bridesmaids is a verified success. She had the highest debut of any "SNL" cast member in a feature film, beating Will Ferrell's feature debut in Old School both in revenue and attendance, according to Box Office Mojo. Apatow will surely produce more female-centered comedies, and it looks like he already has one in his back pocket: IMDB lists the project Business Trip, which centers on a group of women goofing off on corporate excursion. Apatow's wife Leslie Mann is attached, and the script comes from Stacey Harman, a green screenwriter whose only other credit is an adaptation of an irreverent how-to book called The Hookup Handbook. Even if there's no Bridesmaids II, the film's $26.2 million weekend means audiences can look forward to some female-driven comedies that focus on friends and work, not finding true love.