Last night, HeyUGuys attended the World Premiere of Disney’s new movie, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (you can see all our coverage here). The big change in this premiere to all others was the location in which it was staged. Rather than bringing the world’s press to London’s famous and historic Leicester Square, the premiere was hosted by the brand spanking new shopping centre, Westfield which is located in Shepherd’s Bush – a place that unless you live in the UK, you’ve probably never heard of!
I’ve tried to find information on what and when the first ever movie premiere was held in Leicester Square but have so far failed to find the information. I did however come across information on the first ever Royal Premiere on BigBusTours.com who tell us:
The first Royal film premiere took place at the Odeon Leicester Square in 1946, when the young Princess Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II), came as a teenager to watch David Niven star in ‘A Matter of Life and Death’.
Movie premieres have been in places other than Leicester Square before so this isn’t necessarily unusual, but when it comes to one of the worlds biggest studios, Walt Disney Pictures and producing powerhouse, Jerry Bruckheimer, releasing one of their biggest tent-pole and possibly franchise movies of the year, it comes as a bit of a surprise that they’d take what could be a risk.
Iron Man 2 was supposed to have it’s world premiere in Westfield shopping centre to become the first to do so, unfortunately this didn’t happen because the ‘ash cloud of death’ struck forcing the premire to stay on domestic soil back in Los Angeles. This must have comes as a crushing blow to Westfield who would no doubt have been banking on the movie attracting an awful lot of attention and kudos for hosting the multitude of Hollywood A-listers. This is where I need to speculate.
Unfortunately I’m unable to find out how this works for sure but I reckon it goes something like this:
So, Westfield loses the Iron Man 2 premiere (and remember Disney now own Marvel so have a vested interest) and the centre needs to make an impact. They need a big studio with ideally a World Premiere coming up in the near future….. what a stroke of luck, a Disney movie in the form of Prince of Persia is being released in two weeks. It has producing legend, Jerry Bruckheimer’s name on it, a British leading lady (Gemma Arterton), a Sir (Ben Kingsley), a British director and a Hollywod megastar hunk in the form of Jake Gyllenhaal. Perfect!
So however it works, the World Premiere was last night at Westfield but was it any good? Well, the answer is yes, it was awesome!! I was very sceptical as to whether a big film premiere would lose it’s appeal in a shopping centre and yes, there were elements that I missed. It felt rather strange being in a brand new arena with not much history to it but it really did work.
One of my main concerns was that there would be hardly anyone there. Leicester Square has an awful lot of foot traffic since the area is so very social, touristy and vibrant. Piccadilly Circus is just down the road and Leicester Square is a place that people want to come to if they’re visiting London for a show or restaurant. Would people visiting London make a special trip to Westfield Shopping Centre? Probably not. Alex Zane (who hosted the
premiere) said that last night’s premiere was the ‘biggest ever in London’. I’m not sure what he meant by that. Does he mean the numbers of people who were there to watch the premiere were more than any other London premiere? I have to remember that I was in a wonderful spot (thanks Disney) right next to the stage in the final area that the stars were interviewed in. I have no idea of the numbers of people that were filled along the barriers waiting for the stars to arrive. I’ve asked Disney for number that were there last night and at the time of writing, they don’t have that information – even if they have it i might not be able to find out.
OK, so really we’ve not got many answers yet so I guess we’ll have to start using my opinion, and please bear in mind, this is just my opinion….. One of the main focal points of the premiere was the Parkour (freerunning) show that was put on by professional Parkour experts, 3Run. The show was absolutely spectacular and you can see my footage of what they did here. The question I ask myself… would this have been as achievable in Leicester Square? I think the answer would be no. The sound system they had rigged up in the atrium of Westfield was awesome. It has a roof meaning the sound could bounce back down, the event was warm and dry, they had 6 cameras dotted around the centre too and bear in mind they were streaming the whole event live on the Internet to over 10 000 people (you can still see the entire show here). To achieve many of the shots they got at the event would have required cranes. So from a performance aspect, it was a wonderful venue. Coupled with the fact that there are balconies scattered all around the atrium so members of the public could lean over and watch the entire show.
It would be interesting to get Disney’s take on what they thought of the whole event – maybe we will find out in the near future but no doubt in the coming days they’re going to be bigging up that the first ever world premiere at Westfield was a blinding success – and I can’t disagree. The location was great, the temperature was nice lovely (not like freezing to death at the Alice in Wonderland premiere and getting soaked by the rain) since it has a roof and air conditioning and the show was spectacular.
Personally, I’d be sad to see movie premiere’s leave Leicester Square. The foot traffic is great, the transport is easy and the history is wonderful. Being in a square surrounded by an Empire, 2 Odeons, a Vue and many independent cinemas makes you really feel like you’re in the centre of something cinematically special. I remember Simon Pegg at the Star Trek premiere tell us on stage that his dad had brought him to see Indiana Jones at The Empire Leicester Square when he was a child and to be stood in that same theatre for a film he was in was something special. But then if we dont move with the time, will we get left behind. With a new complex being built by the BFI on Southbank, it’s quite possible that we’ll be seeing premieres popping up all over London. If all premieres are as good as the one Disney put on last night, then we’re for some excellent spectacles in the future.
Were you there last night? Have you been to a premeire at Leicester Square before? Should all movie premires be at Westfield / Leicester Square? Let us know in the comments below any thoughts you have on the matter.
