question of the day: How the hell adorable is Tucker Max?
You might have thought that Tucker Max might have taken a hint from the fact that his toddler’s temper tantrum of a flick, I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell, was rejected not only by critics but by audiences: it has earned only $1.4 million and never managed to muster a wider release than 266 theaters. But in a new interview with AskMen.com, Max remains adamantly clueless as to the reasons why his movie flopped:
The movie couldn’t have been marketed a whole lot worse. I mean, no one saw more reaction than me, and no one knows better than me what people think of the movie. I would’ve known long before it came out if it sucked, I would’ve known if people didn’t respond well to it, and that’s just not what happened, which makes the marketing all the more annoying. Because if it had sucked, no big deal, at least not many people saw it… [laughs] But when you make a good movie, and it gets marketed like sh*t, then it’s just so aggravating.
See, he woulda known if the movie sucked, so obviously it didn’t suck. Duh.
(An aside about cuteness: How endearing is it that AskMen.com, which gleefully and unashamedly regularly reduces half the population to the status of sex toys, is so demure that it must bleep out the word shit?)
But Max is certain that his movie is destined for greatness -- greatness, I tell you:
It took a while for the book to really get moving, so I think it’s going to be the same thing with the DVD. Most really good comedies do that. I mean, there aren’t a whole lot of great iconic comedies that were hits out of the box. Ask people what’s their favorite comedy -- what are they? Office Space, The Big Lebowski, Caddyshack... None of those were really hits out of the box. I don’t think Caddyshack did... it didn’t do very well theatrically, did it? Animal House did good theatrically, but I think Caddyshack actually did pretty sh*tty theatrically. [Note: It made almost $40 million in 1980.] So I’m not really worried about it. I mean, what we did was so different and so new, it’s just one of those things...
See? Beer in Hell is on a par with Office Space. Why, it’s even totally similar to Oscar winners!
The much better strategy would’ve been to start in one city, like what most movies do, like most small independent movies, even ones that studios release, like Slumdog Millionaire, Paranormal Activity or Juno.
But it’s all okay, because Max didn’t have to sell his soul to achieve the destined-to-be-classic awesomeness that is Beer in Hell:
Look, here’s what people who don’t create don’t understand, is that once you take money from the machine, the machine owns you. And I was just never ever going to let that happen. I’m not saying I’m so much better than everyone because I did an indie movie. I hate people like that -- they’re stupid. ... This movie, if we had sold it to [FOX] Searchlight, they would’ve put Seth Rogen and Dane Cook in it, and they would’ve cut all the f*cking balls out of the jokes, and they would’ve brought in some sh*t bird to rewrite the script who would’ve had Tucker have a girlfriend and this and that, and then it’s like they own everything, they may have fired me... I would’ve stabbed somebody if they had done that. They would’ve fired me off the movie because they own it -- I don’t own sh*t anymore, but then I’m the one who has to live with all their creative decisions.
Max has integrity, bitchas.
How the hell adorable is Tucker Max?
(If you have a suggestion for a QOTD, feel free to email me. Responses to this QOTD sent by email will be ignored; please post your responses here.)
comments
posted by Accounting Ninja (Mon Nov 23 09, 9:19AM)
Actually, he's making me a little bit sick...
Karma's a shit bird, isn't it, Max?
posted by mortadella (Mon Nov 23 09, 10:50AM)
Actually, he's making me laugh.
Hey Tucker, how's the weather up your ass? I can't imagine where else your head might be.
posted by Cloudy (Mon Nov 23 09, 11:17AM)
Your original review of the (so called) flick was the, err, sh*t(!). Such a wonderfully concise nailing-down of not only the movie, but also the gestalt of the whole sort of "bad-bro" douchebag women-are-whores thing. Hopefully enough people lost enough money on this guy that he can go back to flipping burgers soon.
posted by Brian (Mon Nov 23 09, 11:54AM)
I haven't seen such an endearing combination of narcissism and misogyny since Tom Cruise's character in Magnolia.
posted by Stefanie (Mon Nov 23 09, 1:25PM)
I'm kinda happy that no one explained to Tucker that trying to talk your way out of an epic failure just makes you fail harder. Keep going, buddy: Eventually you'll discover what the rest of us already know.
posted by Mimi (Mon Nov 23 09, 2:01PM)
Come ON. That movie was EVERYWHERE. I'd never heard of Tucker Max, until suddenly, for about a week, he was inescapable. Ads, interviews, reviews. The marketers did their jobs. Does he realize how pitiful he sounds? "Awwwww, guys. It was so GOOOOD. The MARKETING was bad. It's not FAIR."
posted by Steve (Mon Nov 23 09, 2:46PM)
No matter how much you might hate the guy he clearly does have an audience. The book was on the bestseller list for a long time.
I read the interview and what he's saying actually does make sense. I don't think most people even knew the movie existed. I only remember seeing one or two commercials for it.
He's saying he knew the movie was good because he did a premiere tour around the country and saw a lot of audience reaction.
With the movie comparisons he's talking about their marketing not the movies themselves.
posted by Vera Bruptly (Mon Nov 23 09, 3:31PM)
Steve, clearly the movie had an audience, but the audience was not the big one he was hoping for. He was thinking the world at large is just as obnoxious as he is. He was mistaken. The premiere tour was going to be to the audience who bought the book/loved his kind "edgy" stuff, so they were going to love it regardless.
posted by Paul (Mon Nov 23 09, 5:48PM)
Yeah, his book was a bestseller, but his advance was only $300,000. Now, a book has a much lower bar to jump to be a bestseller than a movie does to be a blockbuster. If his advance was $300,000, that indicates how many people the publisher thought would read the book. Not 300,000 people, but enough people to make a profit if they paid the writer that much. So if all his fans went to see the movie, and I'm betting they couldn't drag any dates along, then $1.4 million at the box office doesn't surprise me at all. For a book to be made into a blockbuster movie, it has to have an even wider appeal as a movie. (Jane Austen books as romance, Batman as an action movie) Max Tucker? Not so much.
And Max Tucker doesn't strike me as a very introspective guy, so I'm not surprised he's blaming other people. In fact, if I understand the plot correctly (forgive and correct me if I'm wrong, because I haven't read the book or seen the movie, this hearsay) Max in the movie learns to be a better guy, which is a rejection of the book's unabashed sexism, so the movie did have it's evil d--k cut off, and not by Searchlight.
posted by tomservo (Mon Nov 23 09, 5:59PM)
Christ, this guy needs to go away.
posted by Susan (Mon Nov 23 09, 7:28PM)
Apparently when you call the waaaaambulance in his world, only AskMen hears the ring. They deserve each other.
posted by Steve (Mon Nov 23 09, 7:59PM)
I'm just saying that it's believable that the movie did so poorly because few people knew about it. The book sold millions of copies(it's still on the paperback bestsellers list). That's the audience I'm talking about. If most of those people knew about it the movie would have made more than 1.4 mil. Plus I doubt most of the general population is even aware of his existence.
I know people here are hungry for their little slice of schadenfreude, but I'd hold off. The movie might still do very well on dvd and you'll be talking about how much you hate the sequel a couple of years from now.
posted by Ty (Mon Nov 23 09, 9:05PM)
Dear Steve,
It would be believable that poor marketing was the fault of the movie's failure if that were true. Tucker was the one who devised the revolutionary marketing plan that didn't work. It is wrong of him to blame others now. The reason the movie didn't do well is because it wasn't good- AT ALL. Those who saw the movie didn't tell their friends- I know I didn't. Max was depending on positive word of mouth. There was none. Do you know why? Because the movie sucked.
Steve, stop being simple. The movie will never be successful on DVD. The movie sucked. It wasn't funny. The jokes weren't topical. The jokes weren't funny. It looked poorly made. The storyline was forgettable. The characters weren't believable or interesting. The sound and lighting were amateurish. It was bad. It was the opposite of good. It bit the big one. It could have been a contender- It just wasn't and it never will be.
posted by AJP (Mon Nov 23 09, 10:22PM)
I seriously doubt the book has sold "millions of copies". A quick serahc reveals that it reportedly sold about 70,000 copies in its first year in publication (2006), which is almost always the top selling year for a publication. To have sold even one million copies it would have had to sell over 300,000 copies in 2007, 2008, and 2009, more than quadrupling its first years sales in each of the four subsequent years.
My guess, based on what would be typical sales for a book, is that it probably has sold somewhere in the neighborhood of 125,000 copies or so. Ar most.
posted by MaryAnn (Tue Nov 24 09, 12:03AM)
Max himself was claiming, only a year ago, that the book had sold 400,000 copies. That's not bad, as book sales go, but it ain't millions. (Another source here concurs.)
Since Bookscan sales numbers are not publicly available, we can't confirm these numbers (unless someone here works for a publisher or agent or other entity that has a corporate account with Bookscan). Knowing Max as we do, it's probably a good bet that he's exaggerating his book sales.
But let's assume that 400,000 number is accurate, and reflective of a rabid fanbase. If every one of those book purchasers bought a movie ticket at an average ticket price of $7.18...that's $2.9 million.
Just sayin'.
posted by AJP (Tue Nov 24 09, 10:21AM)
I got my 70,000 in the first year figure from here:
http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6374594.html
If this one is true, then Tucker's book would have had to have a very unusual sales history to reach 400,000 by 2008, but it isn't impossible. On the other hand, its not that impressive a number for a book to garner a movie audience, for example the Twilight series, apparently, has sold a total of about 85 million copies (split between the four books).
posted by Vinnie (Wed Dec 02 09, 2:24PM)
Tucker Max is a liar and a douchebag.
posted by CB (Wed Dec 02 09, 5:58PM)
LOL. Yeah. Man makes crappy movie, is unaware that movie is crap, and none of his equally talentless yes-men friends tell him.
In other news, George Lucas was shocked to hear criticism of the dialogue in the prequels, since everyone who he would allow onto the Skywalker Ranch assured him it would go down in history along with Keats and Shakespeare.