Box office

Box office
For the publication, see Boxoffice (magazine).
Box office at the Iao Theater, Maui, Hawaii.
Folk Festival box office, Edmonton, Canada

A box office is a place where tickets are sold to the public for admission to an event. Patrons may perform the transaction at a countertop, through an unblocked hole through a wall or window, or at a wicket.

By extension, the term is frequently used, especially in the context of the film industry, as a synonym for the amount of business a particular production, such as a film or theatre show, receives. The term can also mean factors which may influence this amount, as in the phrases "good box office" and "bad box office".[1]

Contents

Usage

Box office business can be measured in terms of the number of people who see it or the amount of money raised by ticket sales (revenue). The projection and analysis of these earnings is very important for the creative industries and often a source of interest for fans. This is predominant in the Hollywood movie industry.

Some complain that industry focus on profit has diminished the attention given to film as an art form. However, analysis of the financial success of films is very influential for the production and funding of future works.

There are numerous websites that monitor box-office receipts, such as ShowBIZ Data and Box Office Mojo. For a list of films which are major box-office hits, see List of highest-grossing films.

On average, the movie's distributor receives more than half of the revenue, with the remainder kept by the movie theater. The split varies from movie to movie, and the percentage for the distributor is generally higher in early weeks. Usually the distributor gets a percentage of the revenue after first deducting a "house allowance" or "house nut". It is also common that the distributor gets either a percentage of the gross revenue, or a higher percentage of the revenue after deducting the nut, whichever is larger.[2][3]

Related film industry terminology

The following is film industry specific terminology as defined by Box Office Mojo.[4] For movies released in North America, box office figures are usually divided between domestic, meaning U.S. and Canada, and foreign which includes all other countries. Weekly box office figures are taken to be from Friday through Thursday to allow for the fact that most movies are released on a Friday. A large component of this is the weekend box office, defined as the box office receipts from Friday through Sunday. In particular, the weekend box office for the initial week of release, or opening weekend, is often widely reported. (See List of biggest opening weekends.)

Theaters is the number of theaters in which the movie is showing. Since a single theater may show a movie on multiple screens, the total number of screens is used as another measure. The theaters measure is used to determine whether a movie is in wide release, meaning at least 600 theaters, or limited release which is less than 600 theaters. Occasionally, a movie may achieve wide release after an initial limited release; Little Miss Sunshine is an example of this.

Colloquialism

The term box office likely refers to the office where "boxes", private seating areas, were sold at theatres and its usage derives back to the 1780s.[citation needed] Theatres today still have boxes, and some cinemas and theatres refer to the best seats as box seats.

The term also possibly originates from Shakespearean times, in which boxes would be used to collect a fee. However, due to thieves, the boxes would only contain a small amount of money, and the full boxes would be placed in an office, collectively called a "Box Office".[citation needed]

See also

Emblem-money.svg Economics portal

References

  1. ^ Answers.com
  2. ^ Entertainment.howstuffworks.com
  3. ^ Express.howstuffworks.com
  4. ^ "Office Tracking by Time". Box Office Mojo. IMDb.com, Inc. http://www.boxofficemojo.com/about/boxoffice.htm. Retrieved 2010-01-12. 

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Look at other dictionaries:

  • Box-Office — Pour les articles homonymes, voir Box office (homonymie). Box office est un terme anglais[1] désignant le chiffre d affaires d une production artistique ou d une personnalité (et par extension leur classement sous forme de palmarès). Il se mesure …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Box office — Pour les articles homonymes, voir Box office (homonymie). Box office est un terme anglais[1] désignant le chiffre d affaires d une production artistique ou d une personnalité (et par extension leur classement sous forme de palmarès). Il se mesure …   Wikipédia en Français

  • box-office — [ bɔksɔfis ] n. m. • 1950; mot angl. amér., proprt « guichet de théâtre » ♦ Échelle de succès d un spectacle, d une vedette, etc., calculé d après le montant des recettes. ⇒aussi hit parade. Être, figurer au box office. Arriver en tête du box… …   Encyclopédie Universelle

  • Box Office — (homonymie) Pour les articles homonymes, voir Box et office (homonymie). Cette page d’homonymie répertorie les différents sujets et articles partageant un même nom. Box office est un terme anglais qui peut renvoyer à : box office, une mesure …   Wikipédia en Français

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  • box office — box .office n 1.) the place in a theatre, cinema etc where tickets are sold →ticket office at the box office ▪ Collect your tickets at the box office. 2.) [singular] used to describe how successful a film, play, or actor is, by the number of… …   Dictionary of contemporary English

  • box office — box offices also box office 1) N COUNT The box office in a theatre, cinema, or concert hall is the place where the tickets are sold. 2) N SING: usu the N, N n When people talk about the box office, they are referring to the degree of success of a …   English dictionary

  • Box Office — eines Kinos auf Hawaii. Box Office [engl./us amerik. umgspr.] bezeichnete ursprünglich den Kartenschalter am Eingang eines Kinos. Inzwischen wird der Begriff für die Einnahmen verwendet, die ein Kinofilm während seiner Spielzeit in Kinos… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • box office — box ,office noun count 1. ) the place in a theater where you buy tickets 2. ) used for referring to the number of tickets a movie, play, or performer has sold in order to show how successful they are: It took £20 million at the box office. a box… …   Usage of the words and phrases in modern English

  • Box office — [engl./us amerik. umgspr.] bezeichnete ursprünglich den Kartenschalter am Eingang eines Kinos. Inzwischen wird der Begriff für die Einnahmen verwendet, die ein Kinofilm während seiner Spielzeit in Kinos erwirtschaftet. Umsätze von US… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • box office — box of·fi·ce loc.s.m.inv. ES ingl. {{wmetafile0}} 1. botteghino di cinema o di teatro 2. estens., aspetto economico legato all incasso di un film: conquistare il box office {{line}} {{/line}} DATA: sec. XX. ETIMO: comp. di box cassa e office… …   Dizionario italiano

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