Hollywood box office suffers its biggest summer slump in 25 years

LOS ANGELES—As Hollywood wraps up the all-important summer box office season this Labor Day weekend, a sobering reality has gripped the industry.

The number of tickets sold in the United States and Canada this summer is projected to fall to the lowest level in a quarter-century.

The results have put the squeeze on the nation’s top theater chains, whose stocks have taken a drubbing. AMC Theatres Chief Executive Adam Aron earlier this month called his company’s most recent quarter “simply a bust.”

Such blunt language reflects some worrisome trends. Domestic box office revenue is expected to total $3.78 billion for the first weekend of May through Labor Day, down nearly 16 percent from the same period last year, according to comScore. That’s an even worse decline than the 10 percent drop some studio executives predicted before the summer began.

And the number of actual tickets sold paints a bleaker picture, with total admissions likely to clock in at about 425 million, the lowest level since 1992, according to industry estimates.

No one can fully explain why. Studios, movie theater owners and analysts cited the usual explanations for the summer slump. There are the obvious reasons: Too many bad movies, including sequels, reboots and aging franchises that no one wanted to see. Some point to rising ticket prices, which hit a record high in the second quarter, according to the National Association of Theatre Owners. Then there are long-term challenges, including competition from streaming services such as Netflix and the influence of the movie review site Rotten Tomatoes. How about all of the above?

What is clear: This summer was marred with multiple high-profile films that flopped stateside, including “The Mummy,” “Baywatch,” “The Dark Tower” and “King Arthur: Legend of the Sword.” Sequels to the “Alien,” “Transformers” and “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchises also disappointed.