WHAT PLANET ARE YOU FROM?

What Planet Are You From?

What Planet Are You From? was financed by Sony for $56 million and it was comedian Garry Shandling’s first starring vehicle. Filming was almost derailed by a pending trial stemmed from a lawsuit by Shandling, who sued his former manager Brad Grey for $100 million (you can read about that here). The trial would have forced the production to film around Shandling’s requirement to be in court and Sony estimated that each week the trial lasted, it could potentially add about $1.5 million to the budget. It has been suggested that Sony contributed some money to settle the case between the two parties, so filming would not be disrupted. Contractually Brad Grey had an executive producer credit on the movie, but had no involvement.

What Planet Are You From? was dated for March 3 and bowed against The Next Best Thing, Drowning Mona, 3 Strikes and the wide expansion of My Dog Skip. What Planet Are You From? had a fantastic ensemble cast and was helmed by the legendary director Mike Nichols, but the movie turned out to be a stinker that was essentially one long dick joke. Reviews were awful and Sony booked the pic into 2,248 theaters, where it was dead on arrival with $3,008,746 — placing #14 for the slow weekend led by holdover The Whole Nine Yards. The few auds that showed up were not impressed and gave the film a toxic C+ cinemascore and What Planet Are You From? declined 51.4% to $1,463,678 the following weekend and promptly lost most of its theater count. It was pulled from release after only four weeks with a dismal $6,291,602. Sony would see returned about $3.4 million after theaters take their percentage of the gross, which barely puts a dent in the P&A expenses and leaves the budget untouched.

The film pulled in a poor $7.8 million overseas for Sony. What Planet Are You From? was the last film Shandling ever top lined.