'Crazy Rich Asians' Had a Word Cut from Its Title in Germany
Italy also cut the same word.
The movie Crazy Rich Asians, a film adaptation of Kevin Kwan’s best-selling novel starring Michelle Yeoh and Constance Wu, among others, is having a bit of a moment right now. It spent a second weekend in theaters at the top of the box office, earning an estimated $25 million and experiencing just a 6 percent drop from what it made the previous weekend, which is an impressive feat for most new releases.
But a very odd fact about the blockbuster film was noted by users on Reddit on Monday: A poster for the movie in Germany shows that the film is just called Crazy Rich.
Next Shark, an outlet described as “the voice of global Asians,” also reported the title change in Germany on August 17. The site also reports that the movie is called Crazy & Rich in Italy.
So why the title change? Warner Brothers did not immediately respond to Inverse’s request for comment on the matter, but director Jon M. Chu recently told to Yahoo Entertainment that “People wanted to change the name of the movie. But the book is called Crazy Rich Asians. It’s a provocative title. I think it creates conversation, which I think is good.”
In the United States, the title of the film did remain the same as the book in the end. But the same can’t be said for other markets where the film was released.
A quick peek at the film’s IMDB page reveals that Crazy Rich Asians is in fact known by different titles depending on what part of the world people see it in theaters.
To be fair, there may not be any sort of real controversy behind the title change for this specific movie. Other movies have title changes in international markets as well: Captain America: The First Avenger, was called The First Avenger in Germany.
