Olivia Wilde’s Don’t Worry Darling has been viewed in almost 3 million households during its first week on streaming service HBO Max. The thriller managed to beat Peacock’s Firestarter and the release of the Harry Potter spin-off, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore.
As first reported by Deadline, Don’t Worry Darling has pulled in approximately 2.7 million viewers after its first week streaming on HBO Max after its 53-day theatrical window. The information was pulled from the almost 700 thousand Samba TVs in United States households, which includes measuring 3 million smart televisions (using data on age, gender, ethnicity and household income from the U.S. Census to inform results) and excludes viewers streaming the movie on mobile devices. According to the data, viewers in Portland, Oregon over-indexed at 90%, with viewers in Sacramento, California (+70%) and Boston, Massachusetts (+69%) close behind. This comes after the film grossed $87 million globally on November 7 and opened in theatres to $19.3 million on September 23.
The Wilde-directed film, when using Samba data, beat two other popular movies in household viewership measurements. Firestarter, which grossed $14.9 million globally and $9.5 million domestically, was released day-and-date on Peacock and only reached an estimated 2 million viewers. Similarly, Amblin’s Finch, which was recently released directly to Apple TV+, held fewer viewers in its first week of streaming than Don’t Worry Darling. The release of Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore saw 2 million viewers in Samba’s measurements after its release on HBO Max. The Harry Potter spin-off prequel had a 45-day-plus theatrical release window, raking in a gross of $95.9 million domestically and $405.1 million globally.
Don’t Worry Darling’s success has been attributed to Warner Bros. Discovery’s new mandate about movie releases on streaming services. Run by David Zaslav, the new policy circulates around the idea that a movie can still be capitalised upon after its theatrical window. Previously, the administration had adopted the current trend of theatrical day-and-date releases on HBO Max, the method of which many directors and producers—including Steven Spielberg, Christopher Landon, and Christopher Nolan—have recently criticized for ruining the filming industry. Zaslav has stated in the past that there has been no evidence that the retention of the streaming service’s subscribers has increased with direct-to-streaming or day-and-date releases.
Don’t Worry Darling focuses on a young Californian couple, Alice (Florence Pugh) and Jack Chambers (Harry Styles). Whilst the couple live in an idyllic neighborhood during the 1950s, Alice soon begins to suspect her husband’s new workplace may be hiding some sinister secrets. Written by Katie Silberman, the film stars Gemma Chan, Nick Kroll, Sydney Chandler, Kate Berlant, Asif Ali, Douglas Smith, Timothy Simons, and Dita Von Teese.
Don’t Worry Darling is currently streaming on HBO Max. Check out the official trailer below:
