An Oral History of Magazine Dreams
Part I of a two part feature on the movie that challenged me as an artist.
It seems odd for me to be profiling a movie that only made $700,000 on its opening weekend (and cost $7-8 million to make, depending on who you ask). And it seems even more strange for me to be focusing on one movie outside of a wine and movie pairing.
Here’s the tea: I’ve been waiting to see this movie since it premiered at Sundance 2023. I never thought it would get released after Searchlight quietly dropped the rights to the movie early last year. And now that I have seen it, I got the staff at my local movie theater excited about seeing it, and I have not stopped thinking or talking about the movie since. There’s so much to say about Magazine Dreams (2023), the circumstances of its release, and why it is a critical watch right now that it demands a feature-length article, split into two parts.
Below is the first part of this feature, which focuses on some important contextual details to note surrounding the first concepts of the movie, the production phase, initial festival release, a two year standstill, and its eventual theatrical release. Part Two will explore an analysis of the movie and its themes, and how the backstory behind the making of Magazine Dreams makes it a must watch .
CHAPTER I: THE BACK STORY
“What’s past is prologue.” (Antonio, William Shakespeare’s The Tempest II.i)
The original idea for Magazine Dreams came to writer/director Elijah Bynum at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. While working out at his local gym, Bynum noticed the way that he and his fellow gym users would react to one specific bodybuilder - a massive guy whose presence would elicit darting eyes and a palpable sense of insecurity around the gym.
“No one wanted to be caught in his path, I think because he made us uncomfortable… You have an individual who is both feared and invisible — because of everyone around him. And I thought it was a really peculiar way for someone to move through the world.” (Elijah Bynum)
Legend has it that Bynum spotted Jonathan Majors’ face on the side of a Los Angeles city bus about a year after shelving the first draft of Magazine Dreams and instantly decided on a new direction for the movie. In a fit of inspiration, Bynum reworked the script to account for Majors’ strengths as an actor. The new draft landed on Majors’ desk with a personal note from Bynum, and Majors jumped at the opportunity to broaden his horizons with the physically transformative role of Killian Maddox before reading the note. Jonathan Majors became attached to the project as Killian Maddox, and also served as a producer on the film - Bynum’s second feature film after Hot Summer Nights (2017).
Majors was already in fighting shape when he accepted the role in Magazine Dreams (he had just finished shooting Creed III in Atlanta), but taking on the role of an amateur bodybuilder took another level of physical commitment. The press for the movie’s premiere at Sundance 2023 basically revolves around the question, “What did you do to get in shape for the role?”. Majors’ answer? Three workouts a day (two strength training, one “mental health” cardio session) for six days a week. When Majors wasn’t working out on set, he was downing protein shakes and lots of chicken breasts, to the tune of 6,100 calories per day.
Mike O’Hearn - the four-time Mr. Universe title holder with an equally impressive body of acting work - has praised Majors for his dedication to crafting a bodybuilder’s physique, but bringing an actor’s sensibilities to his workouts. In a 2023 interview with Chris Van Vliet, O’Hearn goes into a little more detail about the insights that Majors taught him as Majors physically prepared for the 24-day shoot for Magazine Dreams.
By the time that Magazine Dreams was selected to premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah in January 2023, the Oscars hype surrounding the movie and Majors’ performance had begun. Majors did interview after interview, right alongside Bynum and co-stars Taylour Paige and Haley Bennett. Even after a public kerfuffle regarding the accessibility issues of the festival, the three-person jury that had previously walked out of the first screening eventually awarded the creative team of Magazine Dreams with the 2023 U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Creative Vision.
“This immersive film’s relentless tension achieved through the rigorous marriage of light, camera movement, sound, and an overwhelming performance left us all disturbed, yet riveted. It will reverberate through audiences to much debate. The U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award: Creative Vision goes to the creative team of Magazine Dreams.” (Jury Citation, 2023 Sundance Film Festival)
Since the storied Sundance premiere two years ago, Magazine Dreams star Jonathan Majors has seen his share of legal troubles. In March 2023, Majors was arrested for a domestic violence incident involving his then-girlfriend, British-Palestinian dancer Grace Jabbari, in New York City. By December, Majors was convicted on one misdemeanor count of assault and one count of harassment, and acquitted of two additional charges. He was dropped by Disney from his role as Kang the Conqueror in the Marvel Cinematic Universe the same day. At a sentencing hearing in April 2024, Majors was sentenced to a 52-week in-person counseling program, a $250 fine, and a warning that if he was arrested again within the 52 week counseling period, he would see an additional year of jail time.
As a response to the legal drama surrounding the Magazine Dreams star, Searchlight quietly dropped the rights to the film a month after Disney dropped Majors. Most people (myself included) felt the movie would never be seen by the public.
And then, suddenly last October, Briarcliff Entertainment - the small company that picked up The Apprentice last season, along with three Academy Award nominations - swooped in and became the U.S. distributor for Magazine Dreams. Audiences may recognize Briarcliff CEO Tom Ortenberg as the former President of Lionsgate and the former CEO of Open Road Films, two distribution companies that were small at the time that Ortenberg gave them each a Best Picture Oscar: Crash for Lionsgate in 2006, and Spotlight for Open Road in 2016. Magazine Dreams was given a late March release date at 815 movie theaters across the United States, and a dream of a new life for a movie that many had understood to be an unseen masterpiece.
“Elijah’s film made a well-deserved splash… Jonathan Majors’ transcendent performance as Killian Maddox will undoubtedly be remembered as one of the most compelling and transformative roles in recent cinema history. We are honored to bring this extraordinary work to theaters nationwide, inviting audiences to witness a story that will resonate long after the credits roll.” (Tom Ortenberg, Briarcliff Entertainment CEO)
In generating press for the release of Magazine Dreams, Majors has been on the cover of The Hollywood Reporter (with strong endorsements from people like Michael B. Jordan, Whoopi Goldberg, and Matthew McConaughey), and he’s appeared on Sherri Shepherd's talk show, handing her a tissue when she gets emotional about Majors’ performance in the movie.
So what makes the movie special?
Take a look at Part II below.
I got to see Magazine Dreams at Sundance back in the day! It's a pretty moving movie, for any of us with obsessive, unhealthy dreams.
One note on the "6100" calories a day mention - that is a typical Hllywood bullshit number that has no bearing on reality and I really wish Hollywood would stop trotting numbers like that out for people to try to compete with to get movie star bods.
At 6100 calories a day you'd gain 8 lbs every week and most of it fat (you can't make muscle fast enough). To put this in perspective, a 6'3'' 35 year old man at 280lbs who led an "Extremely Active Lifestyle" would only need to eat 4803 Calories a day to maintain that weight. Majors was only maintaining 202 lbs on a 6' frame for Magazine Dreams. That would take closer to 3842 calories a day to maintain. Nothing approaching 6100!