The impact of awards season on TV series is transparent, since episodic series are indigenous to streaming. Feature film release patterns make the gauging of streaming impact more challenging.
Today’s Streaming Watch takes a look at the streaming performance of the winners and most-nominated films in the Academy Award categories of Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress/Actor and Best Supporting Actress/Actor.
These charts emphasize the disparate cadence of releases across each film. Now let’s compare activity for the winning and nominated films in their first 12 weeks of release:
This graph shows how A Real Pain has benefited from its availability on both VOD and on Hulu prior to the announcement of the Oscar nominations on January 25. At first glance, it appears that Anora’s streaming minutes lagged behind its cohorts. However, it wasn’t released on SVOD until after its Oscar wins, and its theatrical window enabled it to ultimately outperform A Real Pain at the box office while capitalizing on its post-Oscars SVOD release. Significantly, The Brutalist is only available on VOD and is still performing competitively with Emilia Perez and Anora.
The next comparison is between the movies with the highest nominations in the major categories that didn’t win any of those awards. The clear winner is Wicked, which had the advantage of massive audience awareness due to the well-loved source material and Ariana Grande’s star power. Conclave also benefitted from both a well-known cast and an early SVOD release on Peacock.
But the real question is how great an impact Oscar nominations and awards have on the number of streaming views for a film. This chart shows the day-over-day bump in views that these films got from being nominated for an Oscar, the Oscars telecast and an SVOD release between those time frames.
Wicked’s SVOD release on Peacock leaves everything else in the dust, followed by the post-Oscar telecast bumps for Conclave and A Complete Unknown, respectively. The bump for A Complete Unknown is especially impressive given that it was only available on VOD. The next big boost was for Anora’s SVOD release on Hulu. While Oscar nominations are helpful, in this sample, they are not as impactful as the awards ceremony and availability on streaming.
Looking at the whole picture, films with recognizable talent and/or IP, combined with streaming accessibility, are best-positioned to capitalize on awards season. Box office alone isn’t enough, particularly for lower budget, independent films.
Are film distributors leaving money on the streaming table in the name of theatrical prestige? It appears so.
