Posted in: Lionsgate, Movies | Tagged: francis ford coppola, Megalopolis

Megalopolis: Lionsgate Reportedly Parts Ways With Marketing Consultant

Lionsgate has reportedly parted ways with the marketing consultant who came up with the Megalopolis trailer with the fake quotes.

Megalopolis has been messy for a while now, and it is just because of the contentious Cannes debut, though that certainly didn't help. The film spent a long time in development hell and had so much trouble finding financing that director Francis Ford Coppola ended up just financing it himself. However, once the movie was made, the reactions were extremely mixed at Cannes, and the film had difficulty finding distribution with the terms that Coppola wanted; a reported $100 million in marketing was one of those terms. By the time Lionsgate picked up the film, the terms had changed, and they were refusing to cover any marketing costs. Coppola had to cover those costs, which made the release of the trailer this week even more eyebrow-raising. The first minute of the trailer was littered with quotes from famous critics panning some of Coppola's best-known work, citing how he is "ahead of his time" and trying to basically tell us that even if Megalopolis gets critically panned, it's because critics of now just don't get it, and the culture will come around. It was awkward to watch.

It was made even worse when Vulture looked into the quotes and found that they were not real. In fact, the quotes were putting fake words into the mouths of critic greats, some of whom have passed away, so what was awkward became ghoulish. Lionsgate pulled the Megalopolis trailer, and a new trailer has not been released at the time of writing. Lionsgate apologized for the mess up, and today, it sounds like they are making some more moves to correct the wrong. According to Variety, they have parted with  Eddie Egan, the marketing consultant who came up with the trailer with all those fake quotes.

No one is saying much at the moment, but it sounds like this was stupidity more than deliberate malice. Sources say, "It was not Lionsgate or Egan's intention to fabricate quotes, but was an error in properly vetting and fact-checking the phrases provided by the consultant." When Variety attempted to replicate the process of getting these quotes via AI, statements that were rather similar popped up. It's not confirmation that AI was used, but it does appear that someone dropped the ball, and they dropped it hard. We can tell what the Megalopolis trailer was trying to do; they were about as subtle as a 2×4 to the face, but someone decided to cut some corners. The marketing budget reportedly went from what Coppola wanted, $100 million, to $10 to $15 million right out of his own pocket, so it wouldn't be surprising that someone decided corners were worth cutting. However, it's just more bad press for a movie that would already have difficulty pulling in an audience.

Megalopolis: Summary, Cast List, Release Date

Starring Adam Driver, Giancarlo Esposito, Nathalie Emmanuel, Aubrey Plaza, Shia LaBeouf, Jon Voight, Laurence Fishburne, Talia Shire, Jason Schwartzman, Kathryn Hunter, Grace VanderWaal, Chloe Fineman, James Remar, D.B. Sweeney, and Dustin Hoffman, Megalopolis is a Roman Epic fable set in an imagined Modern America. The City of New Rome must change, causing conflict between Cesar Catilina, a genius artist who seeks to leap into a utopian, idealistic future, and his opposition, Mayor Franklyn Cicero, who remains committed to a regressive status quo, perpetuating greed, special interests, and partisan warfare. Torn between them is socialite Julia Cicero, the mayor's daughter, whose love for Cesar has divided her loyalties, forcing her to discover what she truly believes humanity deserves. Written, produced, and directed by Francis Ford Coppola, the film is produced by Fred Roos, Barry Hirsch, and Michael Bederman, and executive produced by Anahid Nazarian, Barrie Osborne, and Darren Demetre. Megalopolis will be released in theaters on September 27th.

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