Will Smith’s biopic King Richard may have disappointed at the box office after failing to even reach $6 million in its opening weekend, which is low even for an HBO Max hybrid release, but the biopic of Venus and Serena Williams’ father has been trending almost nonstop for a variety of reasons.
If it isn’t fans lauding a showstopping performance that’s made Smith the front-runner to land next year’s Best Actor trophy at the Academy Awards, it’s people questioning why the movie has decided to focus on the old man of the two tennis icons at the expense of the siblings themselves, never mind the backlash to how King Richard glosses over its protagonist having an ex-wife and five children before he’d even met Venus and Serena’s mother.
Either way, we can expect the inspiring and uplifting drama to be a major presence on the awards circuit, and it’s been pulling in some decent numbers on streaming to boot. As per third-party aggregator Samba TV, 707,000 of the 3 million televisions equipped with the company’s software checked out King Richard between Friday and Sunday.
On top of that, the 144-minute sports film boasted a 100% completion rate, meaning everyone that pressed play watched from start to finish without interruption, an increasing rarity in the era of on-demand content.
Published: Nov 23, 2021 04:32 am