Art of the Sneak: Creating a Buzz

Gary Goetzman, one of the producers of Tom Hanks’ new film, “That Thing You Do!,” was at a Saturday night sneak preview for the movie late last month when he noticed that the picture was flashing alternately brighter and dimmer on the screen.

Standing in the back of a theater in Burbank, he panicked.

“It was as if the projector bulb was strobing,” he says. “I ran out to find the manager, who said, ‘We just changed the bulb--we can’t figure out what the problem is.’ ”

It was a classic situation for a Hollywood temper tantrum. So why did Goetzman return to his seat with a big smile on his face? “The audience was so into the film they didn’t notice anything was wrong,” he recalls cheerfully. “I started feeling so good about the movie that I forgot to worry about the bulb.”

Sneak previews are all about feeling good. Film studios don’t sneak a film until they’ve done enough research screenings to know audiences already like the movie. The purpose of the sneak preview, which normally occurs on the Saturday night before the movie’s opening weekend, is to spread a positive buzz about a film to as many people as possible.

“In our business, the one thing you can’t buy is word of mouth,” says Tom Sherak, executive vice president of marketing and distribution at 20th Century Fox, the studio releasing “That Thing You Do!” “When people start telling their friends how much they liked your movie, it has an incredible snowball effect. You can’t pay for that with all the money in the world.”

It’s no longer good enough to have people talking about your movie after it has hit the theaters. With the intense media attention focused on opening-weekend box office, studios have to create a flurry of excitement for a film before it opens.

On Sept. 14, Paramount sneaked “The First Wives Club” in 1,100 theaters around the country. When the film made its official debut the next weekend, it broke the all-time box-office record for September releases with a resounding $18.9-million opening weekend.

“That Thing You Do!” had a sneak preview in 1,000 theaters on Sept. 28. The film’s tracking numbers, which gauge audience awareness and interest in seeing the film, rose significantly after the preview showings. The film opened this weekend at No. 3 in the box-office rankings, with a weekend gross of $6.2 million.

Sneak previews don’t guarantee success, but they often give films an extra boost of opening-weekend momentum. “It’s a way to separate yourself from the pack,” says “First Wives” producer Scott Rudin. “We knew we were looking good in the weeks before we opened, but we thought having sneaks would really turn people on. It was a way for us to reach a broader audience.”

So why don’t studios sneak every movie that gets good reactions from preview audiences? One reason is the cost. In many ways it’s like a dress-rehearsal opening weekend. To ensure that enough people show up at the sneak, studios must buy an expensive array of TV and newspaper ads, which appear in the days just before the Saturday preview. The TV ads can cost $2 million or more, with an additional $1 million for newspaper ads.

The movie being sneaked doesn’t even earn its own box-office gross--it goes to the film that gives up its showing. For that reason, studios try to schedule sneaks in a theater playing a film they already have in release. Most of “The First Wives Club” sneaks were in theaters showing “A Very Brady Sequel,” another Paramount film. The sneaks for “That Thing You Do!” played in theaters showing Fox’s “Independence Day.” They brought in roughly $700,000, which was credited to the summer blockbuster, which is now sixth on the all-time box-office list.

While some filmmakers complain about this unusual accounting procedure, others say it’s a small price to pay for the exposure. “If you have the goods, you should show ‘em,” Rudin says. “There’s nothing wrong with giving up $2 million [in grosses] if you know you have $98 million more coming your way.”

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Because sneaks can be costly, studios use them only for films that can most benefit from the word of mouth. It is uncommon for studios to sneak broad comedies, formulaic action films or films with A-list movie stars. “The films that lend themselves most to sneaks are the ones that can’t easily be sold in a 30-second trailer,” says Arthur Cohen, president of worldwide marketing at Paramount. “They’re usually pictures with a complex story line or unusual character development that don’t have built-in star appeal.”

Even though “Forrest Gump” had Hanks at the top of the bill, it was such an unconventional story that Paramount used sneaks to help launch the film. Fox sneaked “Die Hard” twice to persuade moviegoers that Bruce Willis could make the transition from smirking TV detective to action star. Disney was so eager for audiences to see “Sister Act” that it sneaked the film two weeks in a row. Warner Bros. did the same with “Dave.”

“We couldn’t get the interest level for the movie up to the quality of the movie we had--it was better than any of the marketing material we had for it,” recalls Warner marketing chief Rob Friedman. “So when it’s difficult to explain what a movie’s about, you just show people the movie--it sells itself.”

Sneaks help information-hungry studio executives gauge their new film’s playability. As soon as a sneak is over, theater managers report in with estimates of crowd size and audience response. At select theaters, audiences participate in informal exit studies. They supply valuable demographic information about the age and sex of the audience. But most importantly, they reveal word-of-mouth potential.

“The key question we ask is ‘How likely are you to recommend the movie to a friend?’ ” explains one studio marketing chief. “There are five responses, from definitely recommend and probably recommend on down to definitely not recommend. You want the top one--definitely recommend--to be at least close to 60%. If you’re getting less, you’re in trouble.”

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Just how much a round of sneaks can help awareness was put to the test this past weekend by New Line Cinema, which had sneaks in 600 theaters for its new Geena Davis film, “The Long Kiss Goodnight.” The film’s awareness numbers have been lagging significantly behind those of “The Chamber” and “The Ghost and the Darkness,” two rival major-studio films vying with “Long Kiss” for this weekend’s box-office crown.

Rival studio marketing executives say the sneaks are a longshot gamble by New Line, which desperately needs a hit film after a string of box-office duds, most recently by “Last Man Standing,” which opened poorly despite the star presence of Willis.

Chris Pula, New Line’s president of marketing, insists the studio isn’t worried, saying “Long Kiss” will appeal to a broad spectrum of moviegoers. “We wouldn’t sneak the film unless we thought it had very strong playability,” he says. “Our awareness numbers are low only because we had to wait for finished effects footage so we could put out a trailer.

“We took the same heat for being late into the market with ‘Seven’ and we still had a huge hit. We expect our awareness numbers will be right where we want them to be by the time ‘Long Kiss’ hits the theaters.”