Amazon MGM Gives ‘Nickel Boys’ the ‘American Fiction’ Release Strategy

RaMell Ross' awards season contender has been pushed from a planned October opening to a platform release beginning December 13 in NYC.

“Nickel Boys,” the acclaimed drama from director RaMell Ross based on a Colson Whitehead novel, is being pushed from its planned release in October to now open in a platform release late in the year in December.

Amazon MGM is rescheduling “Nickel Boys” from a release on October 25 in New York City and November 1 in Los Angeles to now open December 13 in NYC and December 20 in LA, an individual with knowledge of the shift told IndieWire. The film premiered at Telluride and was the opening night film for the New York Film Festival.

The change is significant for a serious Oscar front runner. But distributor Amazon MGM is thinking of another movie of its own that worked its way to some Oscar glory with the same exact approach: last year’s “American Fiction.”

That film too, directed and written by Cord Jefferson and starring Jeffrey Wright, opened in limited release on the same weekend, December 15 in New York, before expanding to Los Angeles and then wider into January, all after winning the Audience Award at TIFF and playing the fall festival circuit. It wound up winning an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay, but it also managed to gross $22.4 million worldwide before it ultimately wound up streaming on Amazon Prime Video.

By January 26, “American Fiction” reached over 1,700 screens and saw a 48 percent box office jump over its prior week in what was then its seventh weekend of release. The film expanded even further to a peak of over 1,900 screens the week after and kept word of mouth strong. The studio hopes giving “Nickel Boys” a long runway will be key for its awards season and commercial prospects.

Another comp is “The Zone of Interest” from A24, to which “Nickel Boys” has been compared because of its documentary-like elements . A24 premiered it at Cannes last year, opened it on the same weekend as “American Fiction” and sent it wide the same time “American Fiction” went. “Zone of Interest” legged out to $8.6 million domestic and made a whopping $52 million worldwide.

But Amazon MGM has other ideas for “Nickel Boys” beyond just using the “American Fiction” playbook. The delay also gives the distributor the chance to make additional 35mm prints of the film ahead of its December release. And “Nickel Boys” faces a significant amount of competition from other awards players and specialized releases.

Opening on October 25 are films like Focus Features’ “Conclave” and IFC Films’ “Memoir of a Snail,” and still hanging around in theaters from earlier in the month will be films like Palme d’Or winner “Anora” (Neon) and Sundance darling “Exhibiting Forgiveness” (Roadside Attractions). Opening into November are films like “Queer” (A24) and “Juror No. 2.” (Warner Bros.)

December though is less crowded for platform releases. Opening on Dec. 13 are two wide releases, “The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim” and “Kraven the Hunter,” though it will also contend with A24’s “The Brutalist” on Dec. 20 and “Babygirl” on Christmas Day.

“Nickel Boys” is based on Whitehead’s 2019 novel, which won the Pulitzer Prize. The film hails from Orion Pictures and follows two young Black men navigating reform school in Jim Crow-era Florida. The story is inspired by a real Florida reform school that hid decades of abuse against its residents. The novel alternates between 1960s Tallahassee and the 2010s and shows the students revisiting what happened on the campus.

The film has a radical visual structure, with the camera largely viewing everything that happens from the first-person perspective of its two main characters and even mirroring Ross’ documentary film work. IndieWire’s A-grade review said the approach “so viscerally and fundamentally centers the experience of its young Black characters that even the most racist brand of revisionist history could never hope to deny their truth.”

“Nickel Boys” stars Ethan Herisse and Brandon Wilson as the two young leads alongside Hamish Linklater, Fred Hechinger, Daveed Diggs, and Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, the latter of whom seems assured of another Oscar nomination.

Ross co-wrote the film with Joslyn Barnes. Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, and David Levine for Plan B produced alongside Barnes, and the executive producers are Brad Pitt, Gabby Shepard, Emily Wolfe, Kenneth Yu, and Chadwick Prichard.

Deadline first reported the news of the date shift.