Barrymore's box office popularity
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — John Barrymore
TonTon — 4 years ago(January 20, 2022 12:52 PM)
I was surprised to see that John Barrymore never appeared on any top ten or top twenty five lists despite the fact that he was a popular matinee idol in both the silent and sound era. In fact, his brother, Lionel, appeared a few times of the top twenty five lists. It's often been said that John was the most popular of the famous trio [Ethel never appeared on any lists], but this does not appear to be the case.
All I can find for John Barrymore is some random ranking at number 32 in 1933. -
telegonus — 4 years ago(March 13, 2022 06:08 AM)
Best I can come up with: film statistics as far as box-office grosses were calculated differently back in golden age Hollywood in the studio system. John Barrymore appeared in a lot of MGM pictures, and he spent some years with Warners as well. He was, as the saying goes, a "prestige" attraction; and also, he tended to appear in major motion pictures, if not top billed, prominently billed; in his best years he appeared often in all-star pictures, thus while he could be credited when a film he appeared in made money, occasionally he could be blamed when it didn't. Bottom line: John Barrymore was more a respected film attraction than a box-office draw; and yet many of his movies made decent money, some decent money and then some, while many more just broke even. In this I think his career compares favorably with Meryl Steep's, Robert Duvall's and certainly, from across the Pond, Laurence Olivier. Barrymore's matinee idol days were more on stage, in the theater, and I suspect that's what put him over as a handsome lead and, when at the top of his game professionally, a moneymaking major star.