Selling the Black Film in a Country Full of White Theaters

One key to attracting interracial audiences to black-themed movies is making sure they’re shown in more theaters outside black neighborhoods and art houses, which distribution experts say is the traditional pattern of booking them.

But black films often meet resistance in middle-class white neighborhoods, particularly in suburban malls where merchants claim to fear the loss of white patrons and what they gingerly call “racial incidents” of violence, according to both distributors and black filmmakers.

New Line’s “House Party” was one of the few films to crack that barrier, though it did meet with some resistance in white neighborhoods. One Hollywood distributor argued that white theater owners weren’t threatened by “House Party,” which was billed as a black “Risky Business” that didn’t tackle such explosive issues as inner-city violence.

Earlier this year, several theaters around the country dropped Warner’s “New Jack City” after teens in Westwood who had waited in a sold-out line rioted. But Warner executives said extra bookings that came as a result of the film’s box office success more than made up for those losses.

Capitalizing on director Spike Lee’s growing following, Universal Pictures gave “Jungle Fever” a wider release than it had given his earlier “Do the Right Thing.” “Jungle Fever” opened in every major city, and this weekend the opening run was increased from 636 to nearly 800 theaters.

Universal executives said the film played well in the South. “People get ideas about those areas, but I didn’t have any trouble getting the film booked in the South,” said Fred Mound, Universal Pictures’ distribution president. “There was no opposition to it (from theater owners) at all.”

The film is building a relatively broad following. On opening weekend, for example, the per-screen average for the Atlanta area--where it played on 24 screens--was higher than in Los Angeles. At close to $10,000 a screen, Atlanta’s per-screen was also higher than the national average of $8,385, Mound said.

Business was less impressive in cities with small black populations, like Salt Lake City, though Mound attributes some of that to economic conditions. In Canada and France, “Jungle Fever” is drawing bigger audiences than “Do the Right Thing.”