A month ago a trade reporter allegedly tweeted that “a major Oscar late-release” will run three hours. (I wrote the reporter in question to confirm yay or nay, but he didn’t reply.) I subtracted Licorice Pizza (133 minutes), Don’t Look Up (145 minutes) and Nightmare Alley (139 minutes). If the trade reporter was correct, that left Steven Spielberg‘s West Side Story as the only possible elephant in the room.

But it’s not. The Wikipedia page links to New Zealand’s United Cinemas chain, and a West Side Story page says it runs 156 minutes.

I noted a while back Robert Wise’s Oscar-winning West Side Story (’61) ran 152 minutes. I said that “if Spielberg’s version runs shorter than Wise’s, I’ll be fucking flabbergasted.” Well, there we go.

A couple of hours ago I tweeted Malcolm Hollis about Laurent Bouzereau‘s “West Side Story: The Making of the Steven Spielberg Film” (due on 11.16) and asked if it mentions the running time. “I’m hearing it’s 180 minutes,” I wrote.

A half-hour later West Side Story star Rachel Zegler (occupying Natalie Wood‘s Maria role) replied “our movie is not 3 hours long.” Thanks, Rachel!