Sydney Sweeney’s Americana director defends film after disappointing box office debut

Sydney Sweeney’s latest project Americana may have struggled to find its footing at the box office, but director Tony Tost insists the film should not be written off so quickly.

The 54-year-old filmmaker, making his directorial debut, described the movie as a “hidden gem” that may ultimately outlive the cultural controversies that surrounded its release.

“One of the great things about movies is that they outlive the zeitgeist into which they were released,” Tost wrote on X (formerly Twitter). “As someone whose first film sorta got gobbled up by the zeitgeist, I’ll be curious to see how it’ll stand up after this moment is over. Hopefully fairly well!”

Americana, a crime comedy starring Sydney Sweeney, Halsey, Paul Walter Hauser, Simon Rex and Eric Dane, opened in US theatres on August 15.
Despite screening across more than 1,000 cinemas, the film only managed $500,000 on its opening weekend against a reported $9 million budget, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The release came on the heels of intense controversy involving Sydney Sweeney’s American Eagle ad campaign. The advert, titled Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans, played on the pun between “genes” and “jeans.”
It showed the actress buttoning up denim trousers while referencing traits passed down from parents. The campaign went viral after critics accused the brand of promoting “Nazi propaganda” by featuring a blonde, blue-eyed star in a way some claimed invoked eugenics imagery.

Though many defended the campaign as harmless wordplay, the backlash dominated social media discussions in the weeks before Americana hit theaters, potentially overshadowing its launch. Reflecting on this,
Tost admitted: “Back in 2022, when I was documenting the post-production process of Americana on Letterboxd, I knew I was creating a ‘hidden gem’ type movie as opposed to a blockbuster, or auteur masterpiece.”

Americana first premiered at South by Southwest (SXSW) in March 2023. However, its journey to theaters was complicated by the bankruptcy of Bron Studios, its production company, just months later. The film’s eventual release came more than two years after its festival debut, limiting its promotional momentum.

Despite the poor commercial returns, critical reviews were more encouraging. The New York Times described the film as a “slick and skillful debut feature,” while Variety praised Tost’s direction, noting that his first feature “arrives more polished than most filmmakers’ third or fourth.”

Sweeney, who plays a waitress with a stammer aspiring to be a country singer, received support from her co-star Halsey. The singer urged audiences to see the film, calling it “exceptional” and dismissing the denim ad backlash as “24-hour gossip tabloid bulls***.” She added: “If you love cinema, then you should know that cinema comes first. This is cinema.”