The marketing of ‘Billy Jack’ during the re-release in 1973 remains legendary even today. Think about it: Tom took a picture that had been a huge hit in 1971, two years earlier, and was pushing it back out into theaters in some places in less than 14 months. Even though theater owners made huge money on ‘Billy Jack’ the first time, they didn’t want to play it again so soon. Theater owners wanted to play something new. In order to get the theaters to play his film, Tom had to rent the theaters, called 4-walling, meaning your the film distributor are renting the theaters four walls for the night.
There’s much more to the story, including an Assistant Secretary of Defense who developed the financial models that drove the re-release, including all media buys, that played all kinds of promotional material Tom created like the Billy Jack show pictured here.
In what may have been one of the first infomercials, and what was certainly another marketing innovation developed for the 1973 re-release, Tom taped a show where he was interviewed a set list of questions in order to explain why he was re-releasing the film, explain some of the story behind the film, and generally build interest to get viewers to want to go to the theater and see the film. It worked. ‘Billy Jack’ made more than $30,000,000 during the re-release.
Tom appearing on promotional TV show he created during marketing of 'Billy Jack'
pure genius.