In its first week after being released, Anyone But You brought in barely $6 million—not even a quarter of the $25 million it cost Sony to make. However, instead of preparing to pull the film early from theaters, the studio dug in its heels. As 2024 began, the romantic comedy became the year’s first box-office success story, turning major attention back towards the genre and proving that a comeback for studio rom-coms may be on the horizon.
Anyone But You, starring Sydney Sweeny and Glen Powell, follows the tumultuous journey of characters Bea and Ben. After an amazing first date, Bea and Ben’s fiery attraction turns ice-cold until they find themselves unexpectedly reunited at a destination wedding in Australia. In an attempt to distract Bea’s parents and Ben’s ex, the pair do what any two mature adults would: pretend to be a couple.
Sony director Will Gluck understood the gamble taken with his latest rom-com. In December of 2023, Gluck welcomed an audience at the New York City premiere of “the last romantic comedy to be made by a Hollywood studio,” he jokingly told Business Insider (BI).
Initially it seemed as though Gluck’s joke may become a reality, as the film, inspired by William Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing,” wasn’t recognized as a hit until several weeks after its release.
Fueled by an explosion on social media platform, TikTok, word of mouth significantly impacted the film’s box-office numbers. In the movie’s second week in theaters, it performed a remarkable rebound, earning approximately $8.7 million, and the following week brought in $9.7 million, all despite being played at the same number of theaters as its opening week. To date, Anyone But You has brought in almost seven times its production budget, totaling almost $200 million worldwide.
Rom-coms first arose as a growing genre in the 1990s with the releases of beloved classics like the enchanting rendezvous of Pretty Woman, The Wedding Singer and 10 Things I Hate About You. Studios in the early 2000s saw continued popularity with the daring escapades of How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days and charming antics of Hitch, proving that cupid’s arrows are just as potent in the 21st century. However, by the 2010s, rom-coms were on the decline, with zero studio releases in 2017, as superhero films like the Marvel Cinematic Universe dominated.
With the lack of major studio interest, streaming services picked up the genre with hopes of reviving it. Although films like Netflix’s Set It Up in 2018 were well received, audiences noticed differences in production quality–as streaming services simply couldn’t provide as large of budgets as major studios.
“It looks different, it feels different, there’s no question the streamers are shooting them faster,” Scott Meslow, author of From Hollywood with Love: The Rise and Fall (and Rise Again) of the Romantic Comedy, told BI. “Part of the fantasy of the rom-com is it lives in this heightened universe where everyone is gorgeous and witty, and you’re just seeing the most beautiful places. These basic differences audiences are savvy enough to catch.”
Sony’s Anyone But You is a return to form. Set in Australia with stunning views and iconic landmarks like the Sydney Opera House, audiences are transported into a whirlwind romance of their dreams.
Lick-Wilmerding High School Film Club Leader, Brandon Diaz ’26, emphasized his appreciation for studio rom-coms. “Love in the real world doesn’t often actually play out as it’s scripted in movies, but being able to watch something lighthearted, fantastical and wholesome in a rom-com is very comforting and hopeful,” he said.
However, Anyone But You isn’t the first studio rom-com in the last few years to find box-office glory. In 2022, Sandra Bullock’s The Lost City brought in over $192 million worldwide, and that same year, Ticket to Paradise earned almost $170 million.
Nevertheless, the recent success of Anyone But You could be a more direct result of a larger shift in the greater film industry. According to BI, “Hollywood studios are breaking up with their superheroes,” as audiences have begun experiencing Marvel fatigue, creating the perfect opportunity for rom-coms to swoop in and become the next big thing (again!).
John Fithian, former head of the National Association of Theatre Owners, told BI, “The way to rejuvenate any genre is to make enough of them and make them good. Quantity is as important as quality.”
Sony has already begun laying the foundation for a rom-com resurgence, as they have backed both Anyone But You and the 2023 raunchy blockbuster No Hard Feelings, starring Jennifer Lawrence and Andrew Barth Feldman.
For now, though, fans of the genre must wait and hope that other major studios will also make efforts to reinvest in the genre. However, Meslow remains “cautiously optimistic” that studios will be able to recognize the value of films like Anyone But You, especially to their bottom line.
He continued, acknowledging that, “seeing Anyone But You have this slow burn success is fun. It’s cool to see that movies can still work like this,” he said. Meslow, like many rom-com fans, hopes to see studios become more comfortable with the “slow burn” success of rom-coms, in order to pave the way for a resurgence of the beloved genre and propel it to even greater heights than before.
