THE MOVIE THAT (ALMOST) NOBODY WENT TO SEE

Some movies flop at the box office. Others wind up as outright disasters. And then there’s the special case of a film called Motherhood, starring Uma Thurman, Minnie Driver and Anthony Edwards. When it opened in 48 theaters in the U.S. last October it took in $50,081. By the time it faded away three weeks later, it had taken in $92,900, a disaster by anyone’s reckoning — even for a film that reportedly cost just $5 million to make. Still, the British distributor decided to have a go at it in London, opening it at the prestigious Apollo West End Theatre in Picadilly Circus on March 5 and hoping that word-of-mouth would propel it into wider release. But according to Britain’s Guardian newspaper, just 11 persons bought tickets to see it on its opening weekend. On Sunday, only one person bought one. Total receipts: about $150. When contacted by the newspaper and told about the box-office result, producer Jana Edelbaum replied, “You’re kidding? We must have broken a new record for grosses.” No, the Guardian pointed out, the record is held by an indie titled Zyzzyx Road, which opened in one Texas theater in 2006 and took in a total of $30.