Jon M. Chu is upset he was not able to get 2016’s “Now You See Me 2” to have the “Now You Don’t” title just like the fans of the series have.
While talking with Letterboxd, the “Wicked” director explained that he wanted the catchy subtitle that ended up as part of the third film in the series while his film just got called “Now You See Me 2.” He said that marketing recommended not including negatives in titles despite the name making sense.
“I always wanted to call it ‘Now You Don’t,’” Chu said. “We were told by marketing – we were shut down, they said you cannot use the word ‘don’t’ in a title. I fought this very hard. So everyone saying, ‘Why didn’t they think about don’t,’ ‘Now You Don’t’ – we thought about it. We thought about it! We had it, guys.”
He added: “I’m so excited for [‘Now You See Me: Now You Don’t], I love that people all around the world are excited. We knew that. We know the crowd that loves this, know that there was a lot of love. We had such a good time. We love movies like that, that are just joyous and crazy and ridiculous.”
Clearly including “don’t” actually did not affect the box office success. The third film in the franchise opened number one at the box office last week, beating out Edgar Wright’s adaptation of Stephen King’s “The Running Man” and starring Glen Powell. “Now You See Me: Now You Don’t’” netted a $21.3 million opening weekend.
That gave Lionsgate its first No. 1 since January, when “Den of Thieves: Pantera” and “Flight Risk” topped the charts during a sluggish post-holiday period. Before inflation adjustment, this opening weekend is on par with the $22 million opening of “Now You See Me 2” in 2016.
