That was tough. Dont get left behind. And they did. Im glad it all worked out. So it was strange, if you were a moviegoer in 2013, to see the A24 logo pop up again and again before movies as varied and weird as Harmony Korines Spring Breakers and Sofia Coppolas The Bling Ring, James Ponsoldts The Spectacular Now and Roman Coppolas A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III. So I just called the guy. But I think she saw this, and it hijacked her image and personality, and we didnt ask her. I woke up one morning to an e-mail from Daniel that was sent at three in the morning: Can you go to Pittsburgh? I come into the office, and there are interns running around like in some crazy factory. Sacco: We probably saw 20 versions. The question with any company that lavishes attention and resources upon a modest amount of product is, of course, where does the money come from? I just Your vision is incredible.. GQ Style. Ask for forgiveness. I think it just showed that we cared about these movies so much. Were gonna get there on time. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. You dont watch something like Spring Breakers or Under the Skin without thinking: Where the hell did that come from? They were not the company that they are today. But I do remember finally looking over, because I didnt know where they were sitting, and I spotted Dan Katz and Dave Fenkel, and, man, the smile on their faces! The company said he will exit to focus on "future opportunities," but did not clarify beyond that statement. Sacco: Gun bongs. On the TV side, Jaxs current projects include the recently released Russian Doll on Netflix, starring Natasha Lyonne; The Other Two, which was just picked up for a second season; and the final season of Broad City for Comedy Central. So, how much is Johnny Hodges . And then its like on the biggest stage, I didnt thank anybody! Heading into production nearly a decade after the premiere of Jenkins only other feature (the excellent Medicine for Melancholy), the film has been waiting a long time for a company with the confidence required to finance it. The companys expansion into film is a natural progression as the company continues to produce scripted and non-scripted television as well as stand-up comedy specials. Franco: All the distributors knew it was great. Since then his contributions to growing the company have been invaluable and we cant wait to see what he does next., Added Hodges, I am incredibly proud of the company we created and of the amazing team at A24 that has been integral to its success. [Sofia] was like, Oh, will you at least partner with Harvey? We were like, No!. Slate is published by The Slate Group, a Graham Holdings Company. I dont think it was related to her professional career. John has been a trusted partner who helped conceive A24 and for that we will always be grateful, A24 noted. Garland: I would say that if Ex Machina had been distributed by a big studiothis isnt actually a criticism of studios; its actually just a statement of factthe film would not have been remotely as well received or successful as it was. Beyer: Alicia VikanderI think she read about it, or she saw this photo of her that was being used. I think we lost control. And they were like the third guy at the company. I remember the thing that got him was like, Listen. Deploying for Major CAT Events, tornadoes . Where its like: Im in. Franco: I actually did win some awards. We all go nuts for a few minutes, and then were all like, Okay, what do we do?. We sit in. Hodges: The office literally looked like a pump-and-dump stock operation. He booked the theaters over the phone. Pattinson: I mean, with Twilight, the first tour we did was literally going to suburban shopping malls and doing local-news stuff. With Hodges leaving, the. Were always cognizant of trying to sell the film by not selling it, said marketing exec Jesse Patrone-Werdiger, speaking to A24s rare faculty for promoting around the product its trying to push, shifting the tectonic plates of culture in the hopes of giving rise to a mountain. In 2021, A24 won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress (Yuh-jung Youn in Minari, who became the first Korean actress to win an Oscar). From It Follows to The Babadook, these horror gems didnt have blockbuster budgets. Thats not a go-wide movie. Leave it to Jim Jarmusch to make the coolest vampire movie ever. Over the past six years I have been fortunate to work with a diverse group of talented storytellers across film and TV and look forward to continuing those collaborations in my future endeavors, added Hodges. I asked him what he wants his company to be. Katz: Yeah! Theyre making people want to go to the cinema again to see this kind of stuff, rather than staying at home. It would be fascinating for just the unnerving dread of an awkward gathering of friends, but Kusama then provides the film a killer twist. In the fall of 2012, A24 arrived at the Toronto International Film Festival with a plan to acquire several movies. Katz: Tuesday morning, I remember, we had a little whiskey for him. No additional changes in management will be made, said A24, which will continue to develop and produce a growing slate of content across film and television. There was nothing bad-spirited about it. GQ may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. And I was with a bunch of friends, and we were in the south of Italy, and we were driving into Rome and I kind of had this moment of clarity. Sacco: Youre not like, Oh, we got a Best Picture winner! Youre just like, Oh, we got a great movie.. A24 knew that Slow West was great well before it premiered to rave reviews, but the company also recognized that it was an odd duck, neither broad enough to be a prestige picture nor strange enough to galvanize a legion of fans. Beginning with hedonistic images of Disney starlets gone wild, the campaign consisted of producing Facebook ads that could also function as contentpeople wanted to share this stuff. Other companies wanted to do stuff with it. Prior to A24, all had worked extensively in film and production before leaving their current positions to co-found the company, originally A24 Films, which specialized in film distribution. a24 john hodges net worth. Eggers: In the very beginning, when we went to Sundance initially, I didnt think that this was going to have such a large audience. How do you know when an ad campaign is working? That suits a company whose websites About page consists of nothing beyond an Eadweard Muybridge plate of a cockatoo flapping its wings. But what happens when the titles involved in this deal get bettera lot better? Which is vanishingly rare in the film industry. The company is behind instant fan favorites like Uncut Gems, Ladybird, The Lighthouse, and Everything Everywhere All at Once. Earlier this year I was drinking in a hotel bar with the head of another distribution company at a film festival. David Fenkel (co-founder, A24): We find movies [for which] our perspective, our system, our people, can act to make it something special. Put it on screens. Theyre super-smart people. Katz: By the way, a thousand times out of a thousand, youre wrong. The fact that we were able to sign any movies out of that office is absurd. Since its inception in 2012, A24 has become one of the hottest destinations for indie filmmakers, ushering such edgy films to theaters as The Bling Ring and Spring Breakers. In September 2013, A24 struck a partnership valued up to $40 millionwith satellite television provider DirecTV. in the past 3 years a24 has managed to make from 90 - 110 million at the yearly box office. Fenkel: The world kind of shifted in its direction, where the film was for an audience, and then you realize, Whoa, the movie is needed by other people. You know, theyre big-time. Katz: Maybe even greater. When we started, we wanted it to be about the films and filmmakers, not us, Katz told the Hollywood Reporter at the end of 2013, and that culture remains evident in all aspects of their business. Film-distribution companies tend to be important but invisible: They buy finished films, cut trailers, make posters, and put movies into movie theatersor, more often these days, dump them onto VOD, never to be heard from again. The films were darlingsincluding David Michds The Rover, starring Robert Pattinson; Denis Villeneuves Enemy, starring Jake Gyllenhaal; and Jonathan Glazers Under the Skin, starring Scarlett Johanssonand, by and large, box-office underperformers. The filmmakers were like, I made a good movie. In 2016, films distributed by A24 won Academy Awards for Best Actress (Brie Larson in Room), Best Documentary Feature (Amy), and Best Visual Effects (Ex Machina). And then you meet Barry and hear Barry talk, and its like, Of course! We get movies. And the only thing we could put it in was a cardboard box with duct tape. BREAKING: John Hodges, one of the founding members of A24, has announced his departure from the production and distribution studio to focus on future opportunities. All Rights Reserved. Tinder was yelling at us. [8][28] Its five highest grossing films are Everything Everywhere All at Once ($107.2 million), Hereditary ($82.5 million), Lady Bird ($79 million), Moonlight ($65.3 million) and He was calling me. If anything, it was the bastard stepchild at that point. Everybody was talking a few years ago how cinema had died. So I suppose the question now surrounding A24 is what Fenkel and Katz plan to make of it. Far left, from left: A24 founders David Fenkel, John Hodges, and Daniel Katz. Sacco: Its sobering and motivating in a different way. Variety is a part of Penske Media Corporation. James Franco (actor, Spring Breakers, The Adderall Diaries): This is one of the things theyre great at: taking something small and delicate and giving it the kind of support that other people cant. Katz formerly led the film finance group at Guggenheim Partners, Fenkel was the president, co-founder and partner at Oscilloscope, and Hodges served as Head of Production and Development at Big Beach. Fenkel: And the Spring Breakers trailer dropped the first day of Sundance, and MTVs servers fucked up, because we gave them the exclusive, and they stopped serving the video. John has been a trusted partner who helped conceive A24 and for that we will always be grateful, noted A24. The initial agreement covered 12 films, the first of which was Denis Villeneuves jaundiced doppelgnger freakout, Enemy, starring Jake Gyllenhaal. That didnt come with any veto rights or cut rights, Abrahamson told me. It was such an out-of-body experience. And we still have a great relationship now. It was like Broadcast News. Whatever lingering reservations I had about the VOD side of A24s business were dismantled by the recent rumblings of a demonically possessed goat: The DirecTV logo may still be lurking toward the bottom of The Witchs teaser poster (which accurately identifies and champions Black Phillip as the movies breakout star), but at some point along the way it was decided that this crowd-pleasing, pants-ruining work of art has the makings of a communal sensation, and A24 pivoted. Noah Sacco (head of acquisitions and production, A24): I think some of our biggest movies had no stars in them at the time of releaseEx Machina, Moonlight, The Witch, Room, The Spectacular Now. Since the small blast of trade articles that greeted the companys inception, theyve remained unusually quiet. (Make a left out of the elevators, and then a right at the cafeteria workers.). Beyer: There were like a few ads that we made. Which, if you look two years back, theres just no way in hell anybody would have thought that A24 would finance a film like Moonlight and release it in the way they did, to the tune of a Best Picture and $55 million in international box office. I want to be A24, he said. Probably the best place to screen-test the movie. A mile and a half. So we ran there. A24 is responsible for such films as Lady Bird, Moonlight, Eighth Grade, Hereditary, The Witch, The Lobster, Ex Machina & more. It was a perfectly good jet! Signed on as producer beginning with the third season. Katz: David and I are sitting next to each other. Thats someone else. Korine: I could tell that they were on some new shit, you know? Scarlett Johansson gives the most daring performance of her career in Jonathan Glazers surreal, experimental film. For the company's filmography, see, 20142017: Television and later productions, 2018present: Management changes, partnerships. [6] The name "A24" was inspired by the Italian A24 motorway Katz was driving on when he decided to found the company; coincidentally, the motorway is also renowned in Italian film history as the setting of many small Abruzzan towns and rural landscapes employed in the films of neorealist and surrealist masters. The things about it that didnt were what made me most excited, both for Moonlight and the future of a company thats confident enough in its sense of self to stretch toward something new. Fenkel: Do you have to be a genius to do Sofia Coppolas movie, or Harmonys? And Under the Skin, from Jonathan Glazer, is one of my favorite movies in the past 15 or 20 years, you know? Katz: I always had dreams of [starting a company]. You know what? And so with [The Rover], they took that into account, and instead of blowing loads of money, [they did] more targeted marketing and also really sophisticated online campaigns and stuff. A24 typically pays a bit more for these movies than it does the ones the it buys itself, andlike most VOD content providersit doesnt make its grosses public. And they even never uttered the words, What would it be like in a cheaper state? How A24 is Disrupting Hollywood. And we put in Oscar statues in his hands. The news of Hodges exit was abrupt, but one source said the move has been in the works for some time. Like Under the Skin, Locke, Enemy. 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Rowling More Grace and Listen to Her, Britain's $4 Billion Boss: ITV Chief Carolyn McCall Bets It All on Talent, 2023 Music Festivals: How to Buy Tickets to Coachella, Governors Ball, Lollapalooza and More. Genre hounds stoked by the Sundance hype would surely seek it out, but Eggers extraordinary debutabout a family of early American pilgrims who get banished to the wrong forestwould never be given the opportunity to meaningfully connect with its audience and worm its way into the culture.