We know that the Veronica Mars movie raised a hell of a lot of money through the crowd-funding site Kickstarter in record time, over a million in five hours, and it poured in fast enough to get the movie greenlit by Warner Brothers.
Now reports have come in that the campaign for Veronica Mars has broken the Kickstarter record for most backers on a project.
As Cinema Blend and Entertainment Weekly report, the Veronica Mars movie had a whopping 91,535 backers who chipped in to the total of $5.7 million. The previous record was for a video game called Double Fine Adventure, which had 87,142 people helping out with their hard earned money. (The largest individual donor for the Mars revival chipped in $10,000.)
Clearly, Mars creator Rob Thomas is very happy with all this. “We did it!,” he tweeted. “This is amazing! You all are amazing! My phone is vibrating non-stop. This is so much fun!”
And again, as we’ve mentioned before here on TG, this gives hope to a lot of artists great and small that they too can set up their dream project with the help of the public. CNNMoney is even reporting that Kickstarter is Hollywood’s “new funding model.”
Interestingly enough, CNN reported that Warner Brothers was going to make a Veronica Mars movie several years ago, “but ultimately decided there wasn’t enough interest to commit.” This is where Kickstarter also really comes in handy. What better way to shake up a movie studio or network and let them know there is major interest in reviving a project? Having the fans raise millions of dollars sure beats the hell out of a petition campaign any day.
Thomas and the Mars gang have to love the irony that Warners will be distributing and promoting the finished film, which is on track to shoot this summer for a 2014 release.
As Kristin Bell, Ms. Mars herself, told the fans on the Kickstarter page, “We have the funds now to make a rocking movie for you guys. We are so excited, so grateful and you’ve surpassed anything that we thought you could do.”
