Apple’s WWII drama Greyhound, starring and written by Tom Hanks, has become the largest opening weekend release ever for Apple TV+, including series that have bowed on the service, Deadline reports, citing “sources close to Apple.”
In the new film Greyhound, inspired by real events, Captain Ernest Krause (Tom Hanks) leads an international convoy of 37 ships on a treacherous mission across the Atlantic ocean to deliver thousands of soldiers and much-needed supplies to Allied forces.
Mike Fleming Jr. for Deadline:
I’m told that the film turned in a viewing audience commensurate with a summer theatrical box office big hit, which of course Greyhound was meant to be until it moved from Sony to Apple because of the uncertainty of movie theaters after COVID-19. Beyond generating the largest opening weekend ever for Apple TV+, 30% of its viewers were new to the service.
This will give Tom Hanks something to brag about this evening when he appears on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
The record probably won’t last, as Apple Worldwide Video heads Zack Van Amburg and Jamie Erlicht have been on a tear, reeling in the Martin Scorsese-directed Leonardo DiCaprio-Robert De Niro-starrer Killers of the Flower Moon, the Antoine Fuqua-Will Smith runaway slave thriller Emancipation, and closing last week’s big deal for Snow Blind, the Gustav Moller-directed graphic novel adaptation to star Jake Gyllenhaal. There is another one from Playtone’s Hanks and Goetzman, who with Steven Spielberg are back with another WWII limited series, Masters of the Air. That begins production next March.
MacDailyNews Take: 30% of Greyhound viewers were new to Apple TV+! Mission accomplished!