Seriously, we are about to achieve Swifty burnout any day now. The mega-star singer is truly becoming ubiquitous at this stage. It is not enough that her current global concert tour has her frequently in the news, there are also her Capital One commercials in heavy rotation, her tabloid fodder relationship with NFL star Travis Kelce, and the football league leveraging her appearing at Kansas City Chiefs games. It reached the meta point this weekend when Kelce made a cameo appearance on Saturday Night Live mocking the overkill coverage of their relationship. 

And then, inevitably, Swift herself appeared in a skit later that same show.

All of this is coinciding with the release into movie theaters of her “Eras Tour” concert film this weekend, a highly anticipated release that had her fans beyond excited and theater owners relieved to finally have some good business after a rather dismal Fall movie viewing season to this point. It was promised to be a smash release, but speculation over the past few weeks has been all over the spectrum, with estimates ranging from an $80 million opening stateside to over $100 million, and some going well into the $125 million range. Or higher. So how did it do?

Opening in 3,855 theaters the film took in an estimated $96 million (with a more accurate final tally arriving in a day or so), with another $32 million in overseas markets. While falling shy of some estimates, and just missing out on the eyed century mark, make no mistake that this is a massive haul. And this was arrived at by Swift upending the traditional film release format, in a number of ways.

Making this interesting: This film was not a major studio release but instead was distributed by the major exhibitor chain, AMC Theaters Distribution. That decision meant the film was fast-tracked into theaters. The concept to do this was only initiated this summer, and had she gone the traditional studio route her film would have been at the mercy of an established release schedule at those studios. AMC was basically able to set up this debut in less than a two-month window.

Swift also benefitted from a tiered ticketing move as she set a premium on the ticket prices, above the standard market rates. Adults were charged $20, and kids were discounted about 35 percent (technically $19.98, for her birth year, and $13.13 for her favorite number). This was a surefire success, as the estimated cost for the film was no more than $20 million, with promotions looking at the low end of a $10 million estimate.

In terms of history being made this is setting new benchmarks in a number of categories. It now stands as the biggest opening of a concert film, besting Michael Jackson’s “This Is It,” which took in $75 million globally in its first weekend. “The Eras Tour” right now stands as the second-best October debut ever, coming in just behind “Joker,” which netted $96.2 million in 2019. Jackson’s film will serve as the benchmark, as it was huge internationally and ended with a $260 million worldwide gross.

Theater owners needed this infusion, as the past few months have been rather disappointing in terms of ticket sales. Since mid-August, the top-10 films only generated over $100 million collectively one time, and that was the Labor Day weekend when they counted four days of receipts and just barely edged over that plateau. Currently, theaters are choked with lightly seen releases and/or Halloween cash-in attempts, from a new version of “The Exorcist,” “Expendables 4,” “The Nun 2,” “Saw 10,” “The Haunted Mansion,” “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3,” and “The Creator.” 

This will be the real test, as Swift is not as big internationally as Jackson, but her film is still set to be released in a number of territories in the coming weeks as well, so there is time to add up receipts. The real interest is going to be with how this concert film legs out through the next month. These concert film releases are generally a one-week hot event with strong drops in the ensuing weeks, and this is indicated by the presales for Swift’s songfest. 

Of that $96 million figure, about $80 million came from presales. The die-hard Swifties turned out for the debut weekend, but it remains to be measured how long the heat will last. We will undoubtedly be met with more coverage of her whirlwind NFL romance and other nuggets of unessential news items in the weeks ahead.