Fandango Distributes Its First Film With 'House Of Worship' — SkimNews
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- Fandango distributed its first film, 'House of Worship,' a faith-based concert movie featuring 25 Christian music artists, opening at about 400 theaters for a three-day run with exec producers Darlene Zschech and Michael W. Smith.
- Jerramy Hainline, Versant's EVP of Digital Platforms & Ventures, framed the deal as a one-year, full-lifecycle play that would push the title through theatrical, Premium VOD, TVOD, AVOD and ultimately a library berth on Fandango's ecosystem.
- Fandango has been staging non-traditional theatrical content for years — WWE events, the Winter Olympics Paris opening ceremony, a Spanish-language FIFA World Cup with Telemundo, and Love Island USA — with Hainline saying the Olympics broadcast was 'one of the hardest things I've ever done.'
- Versant Media is positioning Fandango as a core digital growth driver alongside its fast-growing Golf business, aiming to replicate the Golf Channel-to-Golf Now/Golf Pass pivot across its CNBC, MS NOW, E! and USA Sports Network verticals.
- Hainline named WNBA, NASCAR, Bundesliga and LOVB Volleyball as content categories he's evaluating for theatrical distribution, saying rights-holders and studios now 'know we're not making this up' after years of relationship-building.
- Fandango rebranded its former Vudu streaming service from 'Fandango at Home' to just 'Fandango' in July to unify ticketing and digital storefronts, and is also building a single ticketing-streaming app and tighter integration with Rotten Tomatoes, which is available in Canada, the UK and Ireland.
Why it matters: Fandango commands connections to 95% of U.S. theaters, so its move into distribution gives rights-holders a turnkey theatrical-to-AVOD path without a traditional studio middleman — a structural advantage as Versant hunts growth outside its challenged linear cable portfolio.
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