Media Decoder: Defying Naysayers, ‘Gatsby’ Proves a Box-Office Winner

LOS ANGELES — “If history is any indication,” a Forbes report read on May 3, “ ‘The Great Gatsby’ will bomb rather hard.” BoxOffice.com at one point projected very soft opening-weekend sales of about $24 million. Early on, several studios were so worried about the movie’s multiplex prospects that they passed on making it.

Oops.

“The Great Gatsby,” directed by Baz Luhrmann, has become the latest example of the Hollywood machinery getting audience interest wrong. “Gatsby,” adapted from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel and starring Leonardo DiCaprio in the title role, is now expected to take in at least $330 million worldwide.

With that kind of box-office success, the movie should be able to generate $200 million or so more from ancillary sources like DVD sales and reruns on cable channels, studio executives said.

Profitability is another matter, affected by unknown factors, including how compensation for Mr. DiCaprio and Mr. Luhrmann was structured. The movie was also expensive to make; executives who worked on “The Great Gatsby” contend it cost about $105 million after heftier-than-normal rebates from filming in Australia. Global marketing costs, after factoring in partnerships, ran $90 million. (Some insiders say those costs were substantially higher.)

Is it surprising that “The Great Gatsby” has succeeded? Apparently not to a lot of movie fans. Who would bet against Mr. DiCaprio in a flashy retelling of one of literature’s best-known stories?

A lot of people did. Village Roadshow, a film financier and production company, showed interest early on, agreeing to collaborate with Sony. But Sony, which had a flop with “How Do You Know” around the time “The Great Gatsby” was getting under way, decided it was too risky.

Members of Mr. Luhrmann’s management team said he then approached other studios but got one no after another: too expensive; mainstream audiences would not be interested; his last movie, “Australia,” was a disappointment.

Warner, with Village Roadshow, finally said yes, but only after Warner’s president of production, Greg Silverman, became an avid supporter of the project.

So, with the money now rolling in, is Mr. Luhrmann’s camp saying “told you so”? In true Hollywood fashion, it is gloating in private while trying — successfully, apparently — to get the word of its vindication out there.

Market Continues to Climb, Defying Fears of a Sell-Off

The stock market rose on Wednesday, with the Dow Jones industrial average closing above 15,000 for a second day after breaching that level for the first time on Tuesday.

Scott Wren, a senior equity strategist at Wells Fargo Advisors, predicted more gains in the short term, but he also said a pullback was likely at some point because the rise in the market was beginning to overstate the improvement in the economy.

Stocks have defied predictions that a sell-off would follow the spring surge as signs emerged that growth could be set for a slowdown. The Dow and the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index have gained every month of the year and are trading at nominal record highs.

Materials and information technology companies gained the most of the 10 industry groups in the S.& P. 500 index. Materials rose 0.9 percent, and I.T. rose 0.8 percent. The two industry groups have surged in the last month after lagging the index for the first three months of the year.

That suggests that investors are moving from the so-called defensive stocks — which offer good dividends and can grow regardless of the state of the economy — into industries that will benefit more if the economy accelerates.

The Dow industrials rose 48.92 points, or 0.3 percent, at 15,105.12. The Dow is 15.3 percent higher for the year. The S.& P. 500 index rose 6.73 points, or 0.4 percent, at 1,632.69, extending its advance for 2013 to 14.5 percent.

The Nasdaq composite index advanced 16.64 points, or 0.5 percent, to 3,413.27, putting its gain so far this year at 13 percent.

Among the stocks on the move on Wednesday, AOL plunged $3.68, or 8.9 percent, to $37.74 after the company reported earnings that fell short of the forecasts of Wall Street analysts who follow the stock. Subscription revenue fell 9 percent.

Wendy’s fell 34 cents, or 5.6 percent, to $5.78 after it reported a 2 percent rise in revenue to $603.7 million, short of the $615 million forecast of analysts.

Whole Foods climbed $9.39, or 10.1 percent, to $102.19 after the natural foods store chain said its fiscal second-quarter net income rose 20 percent. The company also raised its profit forecast for the full year.

Electronic Arts, which makes the Madden football games and SimCity, jumped $3.15, or 17.1 percent, to $21.56 after it projected profits for the current fiscal year that were higher than analysts were expecting.

In the bond market, interest rates eased. The price of the 10-year Treasury note rose 4/32 to 102 3/32, while its yield slipped to 1.77 percent, from 1.78 percent late Tuesday.