Kane Parsons, 20, Sets Record with Backrooms $81M Opening
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- Kane Parsons, 20, became the youngest filmmaker to open a film at No. 1 at the North American box office with his directing debut Backrooms, seven years younger than the previous record holder.
- Backrooms earned $81 million in its first weekend in North America — a record opening for its studio, A24 — and was based on Parsons' YouTube series inspired by a "creepypasta" about a fictional space of infinite, interconnected rooms.
- Josh Trank held the previous record, opening at $22 million in 2011 with his debut Chronicle at age 27, meaning Parsons beat that mark by a factor of roughly four while being seven years younger.
- Mark Duplass, an actor in the film, defended Parsons against online claims that the young director was a front, saying he was on set and "Kane was 100% in control. More so than many directors 3x his age."
- Parsons responded to the same rumors with a tongue-in-cheek claim that 96% of North American and European films are actually directed by a figure called "The Older Gentleman."
- Obsession, a low-budget horror from 26-year-old Curry Barker, opened two weeks earlier on May 15 with $17.1 million and has since reached $104.7 million after four weeks, making it the second breakout micro-budget horror in a month.
Why it matters: Parsons' $81M opening for A24 — a studio known for prestige indie horror — delivered the biggest debut in studio history, eclipsing the $17.1M opening of Obsession two weeks prior. The figure is nearly four times the $22M opening of the previous youngest-debut record holder, Chronicle (2011), underscoring how rapidly creator-to-cinema economics have shifted.
