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Pharrell‘s animated Lego biopic Piece By Piece arrived in theaters this past weekend, but despite the star-studded cast, it failed to make a splash at the box office.
According to a report from Deadline on Sunday (October 13), the film pulled in just $3.8 million domestically during its opening weekend, against a budget of $16 million, which doesn’t even include the money spent on marketing. The movie does, however, have an 81% critics’ rating and 93% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
The box office numbers can soon grow, though, as Piece By Piece has not yet premiered internationally. The UK will get the movie on November 8, while Germany and Denmark will not get it until January. The latter is actually where Legos were created, so there may be a huge boost once it hits the country.
Pharrell unveiled the trailer for Piece By Piece in June ahead of its premiere at the Telluride Film Festival last month.
The two-and-a-half-minute trailer opens with a LEGO version of Skateboard P speaking with director Morgan Neville and saying: “You know what what would be cool is if we told my story with Lego pieces.”
The director gives a surprised chuckle in response, before Pharrell assures him: “Just be open.”
From there, the video briefly chronicles the Virginia native’s journey from a wide-eyed kid with a passion for music to becoming one of the industry’s premiere hitmakers.
Along the way, it shows him getting his start under the tutelage of Teddy Riley, blending rap and rock as one-third of N.E.R.D. and producing hits for the likes of JAY-Z, Snoop Dogg and Justin Timberlake alongside Neptunes production partner Chad Hugo — all of whom voice themselves in the film.
That’s just the tip of the supporting cast, with cameos also coming from Kendrick Lamar, Busta Rhymes, Pusha T, Timbaland, N.O.R.E., Gwen Stefani and others.
As for the unorthodox decision to tell his life story through animated Lego characters, Pharrell explained to Variety: “We wanted it to be a medium for anyone that just wanted to hear a good, aspirational, inspiring story told vividly, in a way that felt like it could apply to them personally.
“That they’d realize that at seven years old or 77 years old, they could wake up tomorrow and go tell their story, piece by piece.”
