A theater in northwestern Oregon said that Amazon has pulled the new “Melania” movie from screening after its marquee offered its own description of the film.
The Lake Theater & Cafe in Lake Oswego, located eight miles south of Portland, is known for crafting witty, creative descriptions of its films on its sign, and the “Melania” movie was no exception.
For the documentary centered on First Lady Melania Trump, the local business’s marquee read: “Does Melania wear Prada? Find out Friday’ and — quoting Sun Tzu’s ‘The Art of War’ — ‘To defeat your enemy, you must know them. Melania starts Friday.'”
In a Feb. 2 Instagram post, the theater revealed that Amazon MGM Studios contacted them, saying they were “upset with how our marquee marketed their movie” and that the tech giant decided the film would no longer screen there after Sunday, Feb 8.
The marquee was later updated to read: “Amazon called our marquee, made them mad all Melania shows canceled show your support at Whole Foods instead :(.”
The Lake Theater & Cafe wrote that they also received “countless emails and voicemails and Google / Yelp reviews (Google / Yelp took them down), wondering why the hell we had Melania here, or disdaining our disparaging of her.”
“Our policies clearly state that reviews must be based on real experiences with a place, and we have removed the off-topic content,” a Google spokesperson said in a statement to USA TODAY.
“Now that it’s prematurely over, the plug pulled on us not from public outcry (always listening, thank you) but by some corporate executive (fair enough, sorry AMZN, please don’t cancel my Prime),” they continued in the caption.
USA TODAY has reached out to Amazon and Yelp for comment.
Theater manager ‘happy to oblige’ with Amazon’s removal
Jordan Perry, the manager of the cinema, said there are no hard feelings with Amazon MGM after the studio told its film booker that it wanted the documentary “off our screens” due to its marquee description. “Was happy to oblige as having the film at all didn’t seem to sit well with much of the local community, or at least a portion of it who are our usual clientele,” Perry told USA TODAY in an emailed statement.
“Not personally seeking to contribute to any left/right discourse — have my views, vote, have conversations with those around me — but I enjoy the arts and nature and I encourage those not actively involved in effecting change, or at least when not actively involved in effecting change, to do the same. We are what we eat,” Perry added.
Following an outage caused by some moviegoers, Perry explained his decision to screen the movie on the theater’s website, challenging claims that showing the film supports the first lady, the Trump administration, or its policies. He wrote, “The marquee may seem mean, but my hope, always, is to, though momentarily fanning flames, ultimately lower the temperature.”
He wrote that an $11 ticket to screen the movie would only give $5.50 to “a film company now owned by Jeff Bezos.”
“Many now call it propaganda, but the word did not cross my mind, and, having watched the film, yes, though it has intentional blind spots, this is ‘Melania’ as Melania herself wants to be known, and not everyone will find it flattering,” he wrote.
Despite heavy backlash and low critical ratings, “Melania” was a box-office smash, notching $7 million in its opening weekend, according to estimates released by Amazon MGM Studios on Feb. 1.