Alberto E Rodriguez/Getty Images
Extremely devastating news: MGM and United Artists Releasing sales chief Erik Lomis died suddenly at his home in Santa Monica on Wednesday, sources have told us. Details of his death were not disclosed. He was 64.
Lomis has been a paramount figure behind the hits of many filmmakers, including Quentin Tarantino, Paul Thomas Anderson, Adam McKay, Sylvester Stallone, Ryan Coogler, David O. Russell, Lee Daniels and Tom Hooper, to name a few, and most recently Michael B. Jordan with Creed III.
After Amazon’s purchase of MGM, Lomis, who made the jump, became a trusted consigliere to Jennifer Salke, head of Amazon Studios, as the streamer looks to capitalize on more hit movies.
Lomis gave Amazon a big taste of the box office with his first box office hit, Creed III, which opened with more than $100 million worldwide and is currently grossing over $225 million at the worldwide box office. It was Lomis’ bold decision to move Creed III out of Thanksgiving and place it in March, where the box art would be away from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and have access to premium screens. The success of this debt restructuring maneuver speaks for itself. Lomis will be greatly missed by many.
Lomis recently lobbied Amazon to delay Ben Affleck and Matt Damon’s first feature film under their Artists Equity label Air from Prime Video to an Easter weekend theatrical release after it went through the roof. This film is already hot after its sparkling SXSW premiere last week.
“I don’t think the industry will understand for a few months what Erik Lomis George Bailey was like,” said Derek McLay, box office analysis partner at EDO, a lieutenant to Lomis in the sales manager’s early MGM-2000s days. “He’s been so many things to so many people that he’s touched and quietly done and he’s involved in everything we do.”
During his career, Lomis twice managed distribution for MGM, oversaw several James Bond releases, and became a valued advisor to the franchise’s producers, Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson. Last fall, Lomis hosted and was the main organizer of Broccoli and Wilson’s Will Rogers Pioneer Award tribute.
“No Time To Die” Everett Collection
Lomis is a firm believer in the theatrical business at all costs, and protected Daniel Craig’s 007 swan song No Time to Die from relegation to a premium VOD or day-definite streaming release during the pandemic, when many of the world’s circuits were closed. He was the first to see how Covid would affect the whole business in March 2020, delaying the theatrical release of No Time To Die from Easter this year to eventually October 2021. Lomis stuck to his guns and made sure No Time To Die had a big-screen release; The film grossed more than $774 million worldwide, one of the highest-grossing pictures during the pandemic era.
UAR/MGM recently had the Oscar-nominated winner for Best Picture and Adapted Screenplay Women Talking by Sarah Polley.
(LR) Erik Lomis and Tom Cruise at the 2018 Will Rogers Pioneer of the Year Dinner (Photo by Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for CinemaCon
Lomis was highly regarded, not only in exhibition circles but also among filmmakers and competing sales executives, for his razor-sharp, outspoken approach to business, astute distribution strategies, and astute box-office forecasting. It wasn’t uncommon for the filmmakers’ agents to call up Lomis over a weekend to review it, even though their client might not have a film in their studio. Notable distribution executives that Lomis oversaw in her early days include Lionsgate Domestic Distribution President David Spitz, Paramount Domestic Distribution President Chris Aronson, and Universal Domestic Distribution Chief Jim Orr. That list includes McLay, who runs Edward Norton’s box office analytics company EDO.
(L-R) Chris Aronson, Erik Lomis and Jim Orr in 2017 Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for CinemaCon
Lomis grew up in the exhibition business and learned from scratch as a movie theater usher in Philadelphia. His father, Irv Lomis, worked for the Philly Circuit Sameric Corp.; Lomis eventually became head buyer at Sameric. United Artists Theatres, then the country’s largest theater chain, eventually took over Sameric, and Lomis later became head of the national film department.
During Lomi’s early millennium at MGM, he served as President of Worldwide Theatrical Distribution, Home Entertainment & Acquisitions. There he oversaw domestic theatrical distribution as well as the marketing and distribution of MGM’s international theatrical, home entertainment and acquisition titles. He had then been a prominent executive and consultant at MGM for more than 15 years. As President of Domestic Distribution from 2000 to 2005, he was part of the Greenlight Committee and oversaw the distribution of Legally Blonde, Barbershop and four of the James Bond films including Goldeneye, Tomorrow Never Dies, The World Is Not Enough and Die One other day.
“The Hateful Eight” Everett Collection
In 2011, Lomis was hired by The Weinstein Co. as sales president, raising more than $1.5 billion at the domestic box office for the label. He catapulted the genre and studio’s award-winning fare to great heights, including Tarantino’s Django Unchained ($162.8M, $426M WW) and Inglourious Basterds ($120.5M, $321.4M), Hooper’s The King’s Speech ($138.7M, $484M WW), Russell’s Silver Linings Playbook ($132M Domestic, $236M WW), Lee Daniels’ The Butler ($116.6M Domestic, $177.3M .WW) and Oscar-winning The Imitation Game ($91M domestic, $233.5M WW). Lomis later took on additional marketing duties at the studio.
One of his most recent accomplishments at TWC was overseeing the rollout of Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight in 70mm for the filmmaker, grabbing inactive projectors and bringing them to theaters. In one instance, during the film’s Westwood LA premiere, Lomis rolled up his sleeves and went to the screening booth to revive a troubled projector.
In March 2016, Lomis left Weinstein Co. for Megan Ellison’s Annapurna as she established a sales and marketing department at her studio. Annapurna would form a sales and marketing joint venture with MGM called United Artists Releasing, which eventually led Lomis to its acquisition by Amazon. Lomis has released Annapurna films such as McKay’s Oscar-winning comedy Vice, about former Vice President Dick Cheney, and Kathryn Bigelow’s Detroit. With UAR, he directed the animated feature film The Addams Family, which grossed over $204 million WW; Ridley Scott’s House of Gucci ($153 million WW); Anne Hathaway-Rebel Wilson comedy The Hustle ($97M WW); Channing Tatum’s Dog ($85 million WW); Anderson’s triple Oscar-nominated Licorice Pizza ($33M WW), which has been a bright spot for art houses during Covid; Dwayne Johnson-produced Florence Pugh with Fighting With My Family ($42 million WW); and the Aretha Franklin biopic Respect, starring Jennifer Hudson. And of course there was the Rocky spinoff franchise Creed, which has grossed over $612 million WW.
Lomis is survived by his wife, Patricia Laucella, President of Legal and Business Affairs at Lionsgate; his children Natalia Jovovich, Nicole Rose Lomis and Zach Lomis; his stepmother Joanne Lomis; sister, Sandy McGuigan; and brother Charles Lomis.
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