I suggested yesterday that Envelope columnist Elizabeth Snead should have attempted an explanation why the Sex and the City is blowing off a big-ass debut screening at the Cannes Film Festival in favor of one in London, especially since Sarah Jessica Parker said Cannes was a possibility in a Snead article that ran on 3.14.
Today Snead ran a portion of an interview with an anonymous Warner Bros. insider, who offered at least a partial answer to the London-not-Cannes question. “A WB insider who refused to go on record told me, ‘One word: recession,'” Snead wrote,. “[The source added] that movie studios were feeling the pinch of a devalued U.S. dollar and that a Cannes fete done right would be far more costly than a red carpet event in London.”
I don’t believe this is the entire reason for one shaved millisecond. There’s no doubting the fact that Cannes is going to be horrifically expensive for everyone this year, but London is no cheap deal either. Everything hurts when you’re in London. I was there last March and I know. It’s just as bad as France. So if you ask me the “London is cheaper” explanation is at least partly bullshit.