Scouting Hollywood: Feb. 23-March 1

A roundup of news, gossip and history of the entertainment business brought to you from Hollywood, Calif.

There’s nothing like erotic dancing to garner box office success. Channing Tatum and Salma Hayek in Warner Bros. Magic Mike’s Last Dance took the box office on Super Bowl weekend, easily outpacing Avatar: The Way of Water.  Jim Cameron gets the last laugh however as the 25th anniversary re-issue of his mega hit, Titanic, came in third. 

Even though major American film distributors have pulled titles out of Russia, you can’t keep art down. I recently watched a YouTube video by an American, married to a Russian woman, who vlogs from Moscow on life after sanctions. One discovery he made was of Avatar: The Way of Water screening daily in the largest mall in Russia. In the video we learn that you can’t buy a ticket at the theater since it was a ‘four wall’ event where a promoter only rents the auditorium and handled all ticketing on a website. The theater gets the traffic, all the concession income, and a rental fee for the space. No word on if Disney was profiting from the rental, however someone had access to the DCP (the digital file) that is sent to the local theaters and it clearly wasn’t a pirated print due to the quality.