Elizabeth Banks – the writer, director, producer and star of the Charlie’s Angels reboot – has defended the film after its disastrous opening weekend at the US box office.
The action-comedy, which revived the franchise with actors Kristen Stewart, Naomi Scott and Ella Balinska, opened to a dismal $8 million (£6.1m) in its first three days of release. The film cost a reported $48m (£37m) to produce.
“Well, if you’re going to have a flop,” wrote Banks on Twitter, “make sure your name is on it at least 4x. I’m proud of #CharliesAngels and happy it’s in the world.”
The film performed so badly that Sony is reportedly pulling back on its promotion.
Banks’s Charlie’s Angels reboot follows in the footsteps of two previous big-screen revivals of the iconic Seventies TV series.
Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore and Lucy Liu previously starred in Charlie’s Angels in 2000 and a sequel, Full Throttle, in 2003.
The new film introduces a global corporation of investigative “Angels”, and has earned mixed reviews from critics.
Vulture’s Allison Wilmore criticised the film’s “girl-power makeover” of the franchise, with dialogue and themes she said are “not actually explored beyond [their] potential to be stuck on a T-shirt”.
Charlie’s Angels is released in the UK on Friday 29 November.
