Box Office Crashes To All Time Low as Theaters Shutter Due To Coronavirus

After one country and the other going through immense crisis due to the global outbreak of Coronavirus, we come across multiple instances of how another new country is facing a massive meltdown.

The latest one is Italy, as in the country, which is suffering the biggest coronavirus outbreak in Europe with more than 350 deaths, box office crashed to an all time low of €439.000 ($500,000) over the March 5 weekend frame. Or rather, the portion of the weekend prior to Sunday May 8.

On Sunday the government ordered a total shutdown until at least April 3 of all movie theaters. Prior to Sunday, roughly half the country’s screens – those in the less affected central and southern regions – had been allowed to stay open, provided spectators sit three seats apart in what turned out to be a short-lived Italian experiment.

Battered by all these impediments, Italy’s March 5 frame repped a roughly 90% plunge in grosses compared with the same period in 2019 and a 79% drop compared to the previous weekend, which had already been a total bloodbath.

Meanwhile the head of Italy’s motion picture association ANICA, Francesco Rutelli, has asked the government to provide crisis subsidies for the film industry sector, starting from exhibitors and distributors.