‘Cats’ on Track to Lose $100 Million as Audiences Shun Taylor Swift Film

The biggest box office bomb of 2019 may be Universal’s Taylor Swift-starring, CGI-heavy, Cats, which looks to be on track to lose as much as $100 million for the studio.

The film, which opened Christmas week, already earned one of the worst openings of the year for a supposed blockbuster film. The studio expected a $15 million opening weekend — already a low expectation — but the final tally was a far worse $6.5 million.

Even some of the entertainment industry’s biggest names could not salvage this bomb. The major motion picture adaptation of the long-running Andrew Lloyd Weber stage play has crashed and burned despite featuring the talents of stars with names as big as Taylor Swift, Jennifer Hudson, Idris Elba, Judi Dench, and more.

The film has done badly in the U.S., but its overseas take is also terrible having only pulled in $38 million after two weeks in theaters. And the news for Cats keeps getting worse. Now it has been reported that the film may lose $100 million for the studio. That would be its entire filming budget and then some.

As the Daily Mail reports:

Deadline reports that if Cats doesn’t reach at least $100 million worldwide ($40 million domestic, $60 million abroad), which appears unlikely after the first two weeks, it will lose at least $71 million.

Those figures are based on the estimated $90 million budget plus a global publicity and advertising spend of roughly $115 million.

By some estimates, the film cost the studio nearly $200 million in production and marketing costs. But so far it hasn’t even made $45 million in two weeks.

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