A movie looking at Asian Americans gets reviews…..
And a push from the Asian American community…
Michael Tow has already seen the movie “Crazy Rich Asians” four times and helped organize a buying spree to sell out an advance screening last week at AMC Loews Boston Common.
“As an Asian actor and producer, there are not many of us. When something as important as this comes out, we have to support it,” said Tow, who is also a financial planner in Brookline. “This to me is our ‘Black Panther.’ ”
‘Crazy Rich Asians’ comes to the screen with big expectations
Marvel’s “Black Panther” became a cultural moment for black Americans in February when Hollywood featured a black superhero from a futuristic black country with a mostly black cast. People bought out theaters and organized group screenings, helping to make “Black Panther” the highest-grossing superhero movie of all time in the United States.
As “Crazy Rich Asians” heads into its opening weekend, Asian-Americans like Tow want to send a message to Hollywood: Asian-American stories are as universal and enduring as anyone else’s, and the proof will be at the box office.
There’s even a hashtag for it — #GoldOpen. It’s a play on Asians loving the color of gold and the desire for Hollywood to strike box office gold during a movie’s opening weekend.
Asian-American entrepreneurs, influencers, and community leaders have rallied hundreds of Asian-American business leaders, nonprofits, and celebrities across the country to snap up all the seats in theaters showing the romantic comedy adapted from Kevin Kwan’s best-selling novel of the same name. They’re spending anywhere from $1,100 to $5,000 for all the tickets and often giving them away for free.
“We realized Asian people don’t support Asian people,” said Bing Chen, one of the creators of #GoldOpen, and a digital media entrepreneur who helped build YouTube into a video juggernaut. “A lot of us realized it was time to counter that.”….
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….propelled by enthusiastic reviews and an eagerness for a major Hollywood film led by Asian stars, “Crazy Rich Asians” is showing almost unprecedented legs. After opening last weekend with $35.3 million from Wednesday to Sunday and $26.5 million over the weekend, the Warner Bros. release — the first Hollywood studio movie in 25 years with an all-Asian cast — has already grossed $76.8 million….
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