When old Hollywood prognosticators looked at the box office on Monday morning, their eyes probably bugged out of their heads as they learned that a YouTuber had conquered the charts.Markiplier’s Iron Lung debuted to $21.5 million globally, but the real story isn’t just the number it put up; it's the idea that you could do it too.So what did we learn from this success? And more importantly, what did Markiper learn, too?For that, we turn to his interview with Indiewire.Let's dive in. - YouTubewww.youtube.com1. Putting His Own Skin in the GameAs filmmakers, we're often told to bet on yourselves, and prove to the world why they should be betting on us. And that's exactly what happened with Markiplier.He had an idea for a movie, and instead of trying to shop it around and hearing a ton of "no's," he went the other way. He poured $3 million of his own money into the production and, in a gutsy move, handled the distribution himself."I had talks about bringing in a studio," Fischbach said, "but the fans were loud: 'Please don’t.' They wanted to see if we could actually pull off an indie film at this level without a middleman."It's funny, but he followed the Taylor Swift model and just approached theaters himself and negotiated a deal where they split the box office 50/50 with the theaters. That’s a massive win for creator independence.And it all paid off.2. A Theater Takeover Driven by FansIf you have an audience, you have to get...
Published By: NoFilmSchool - Yesterday