Gauging the box-office impact of Superstorm Sandy

At the AMC Lincoln Square on the Upper West Side of Manhattan this afternoon, crowds of families stood in line at the reopened theatre for a matinee screening of Hotel Transylvania. An employee taking tickets reported a long, arduous, and nonsensical commute by bus, but he was still

able to report for work. The neighborhood as a whole was virtually untouched by the Superstorm Sandy that so devastated other parts of New York City and left millions in the region without power. Schools have been cancelled for the entire week, so the screening was likely a much-needed relief for haggard parents coping with having kids unexpectedly at home.

Confusion, though, still ruled the day. "Is this theatre open?" a woman asked an attendant in the lobby of the theatre. As face-palming as that question was, she more likely was inquiring if the theatre was back to normal and running on a regular schedule. That's what the box office may be looking at this weekend. The potential upside for East Coast theatres will be the ability to entertain stir-crazy customers who may be without power, or at least without their regular routine, at home. When else can theatres truly offer refuge through escapist entertainment? The downside is that many people may not even know if their local theatre is open, especially with spotty cell service and limited battery power for surfing the Internet or calling around. Or they may not even have the gas to go to a theatre. Or, maybe their house is under water and they have other, more serious concerns.

Variety offers one figure, courtesy of Disney, that attempts to hone in on the storm's potential financial impact. The distributor reported that "roughly 24% of its most recent openings came from 10 major markets hit by the storm, including New York, Boston, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Montreal, Toronto and Washington, D.C. That means those regions would, under normal circumstances, contribute $9.6 million of a $40 million opening for Wreck-It Ralph." If the box office in those regions is down 10-20%, that's $1-2 million. 50% could subtract $5 million from the total. After seeing the crowd turned out for Hotel Transylvania, I think if any picture could weather the aftereffects of Superstorm Sandy, it's a family film. Parents may be grateful for the opportunity to distract their kids for a while, or simply offer them a sense of normalcy.