Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Communication Faculty Publications Department of Communication Summer 2004 A Big Fat Indie Success Story? Press Discourses Surrounding the Making and Marketing of a "Hollywood" Movie Alisa Perren Georgia State University,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/communication_facpub Part of the Communication Commons Recommended Citation Perren, Alisa, "A Big Fat Indie Success Story? Press Discourses Surrounding the Making and Marketing of a "Hollywood" Movie" (2004). Communication Faculty Publications. 3. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/communication_facpub/3 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Communication at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Communication Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. A Big Fat Indie Success Story? Press Discourses Surrounding the Making and Marketing of a "Hollywood" Movie ALISA PERREN DURING THE SUMMER AND FALL OF 2002, neWS- a number of inaccuracies and misperceptions papers and magazines across North America about the operations ofthe contemporary prominently featured articles about the surpris- media industries. These stories have had the ing box office performance of My Big Fat Greek effect of constructing—and reinforcing—certain Wedding. The publications wrote ofa low-bud- mythologies about the dichotomies between get romantic comedy—a movie with neither "Hollywood" and "independent" films, as well Hollywood stars nor special effects—that defied as between the film and television industries. the odds to become the highest grossing in- These dichotomies, in turn, obscure the inter- dependent film of all time.