‘The Fall Guy’ Fizzles With $28 Million in Ticket Sales

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“The Fall Guy” seemed to have everything. Megawatt stars. Death-defying stunts. Splendid reviews. An original story — what sequel-weary moviegoers say they want. Universal backed “The Fall Guy” with a six-month marketing campaign, releasing trailers that racked up 400 million views and carpet-bombing televised sporting events, including the Super Bowl, with ads. It added up to only $28.5 million in North American ticket sales from Friday to Sunday, the worst start to Hollywood’s all-important summer season since 1995. “The Fall Guy” cost Universal at least $200 million to make and market and was released in 4,002 theaters in the United States and Canada. It collected an additional $37 million overseas. This is why studios do not take risks on new stories. “The business is so tough, and it’s so hard to break through with new ideas,” said David A. Gross, a film consultant who publishes a newsletter on box office numbers. “You want to explain to shareholders why you spent hundreds of millions of dollars on a newfangled idea that crashed?”