Jamie Dornan explains how he reacted to the negative review of Fifty Shades of Grey. Adapted from the E.L. James novel series, the first Fifty Shades of Grey film was released in 2015. The film was followed up by sequels Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed in 2017 and 2018, respectively.
Ana and Christian talking while both facing camera in Fifty Shades Darker
Speaking on BBC’s Desert Island Discs, Dornan details how Fifty Shades of Grey’s negative reviews affected him. According to the actor, he “hid,” and even shut “off from the world a little bit” at director Sam Taylor-Johnson’s vacant home. After “films two and three were greenlit overnight,” Dornan already knew that there would “be much more damnation to come.” Check out the full quote from Dornan below:
I think I hid. I was coming off the back of career-altering reviews for ‘The Fall’ and BAFTA nominations and all the madness ‘The Fall’ brought… to ridicule. We went down to Sam and Aaron Taylor-Johnson’s place. They weren’t there. They let us have their place in the country and we sort of hid there for awhile and shut ourselves off from the world a little bit.
It made so much money so like… films two and three were greenlit overnight. It was a strange thing because there’s a bit of ridicule here and I’m now contracted to do two more, knowing that there will be much more damnation to come.
Why Fifty Shades of Grey Was a Success (Despite Reviews)
Ana and Christian talking while both facing camera in Fifty Shades Darker
As a book series that originated as Twilight fan-fiction, Fifty Shades of Grey was already regarded as bad literature. The writing quality did not increase as it was transferred to the big screen, carrying with it the indulgence of smut over story and salaciousness over style. All three Fifty Shades movies were critically panned, with the first film getting a 25% Rotten Tomatoes score, the second an 11%, and the third an equally low 11%.
Just like the bestselling novels, however, the cinematic hollowness of the Fifty Shades series did not at all diminish its box office returns. Fifty Shades of Grey, Fifty Shades Darker, and Fifty Shades Freed brought in worldwide box office returns of $570.9 million, $381.5 million, and $372.3 million, respectively. These totals represented huge returns on the films’ budgets, the highest of which was only $55 million.
For Dornan, the financial success of Fifty Shades of Grey meant huge gains in exposure. While much of this resulted in negative press, the Fifty Shades movies can also be seen as a launching point for the actor in Hollywood, as he went on to feature in several mainstream films including Trolls World Tour, Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar, and A Haunting in Venice. While Fifty Shades of Grey may have been the actor’s first experience with severe Hollywood berating, it was also a formative part of his Hollywood career.
