Yorgos Lanthimos fans based in Los Angeles eager to see his latest film for free are in luck: a cinema is offering complimentary tickets to a special screening on Monday to anyone who is either already bald or is willing to have their head shaved in the foyer first.
The initiative is in homage to Emma Stone’s character in the film, a high-powered pharmaceutical CEO kidnapped by conspiracy theorists (played by Jesse Plemons and Aidan Delbis) who believe she is an alien and shave her hair off.
“Are you bald, or willing to shave your head?” reads the event posting. “On Monday, 10/20, head to [the Culver Theater] for a FREE advanced screening of Bugonia – the new @focusfeatures fever dream from Yorgos Lanthimos.”
Anyone with hair but eager for both a free ticket and a gratis haircut should arrive after 6pm, when a barber will be present to “shave it all off”.
The cinema adds: “This is real. And yes, part of it will be filmed.” Hopefuls need to RSVP, as there is limited availability, and they need to be over 18. Bugonia was given an R rating in the US by the Motion Picture Association.
The latest collaboration between Lanthimos and Stone, following The Favourite in 2018, Poor Things in 2023, and Kinds of Kindness in 2024, has won warm notices from festival screenings. In interviews, the actor has evangelised about the radical hair choice, telling Vogue there is “no better feeling in the world” than a freshly bald pate. “The first shower when you’ve shaved your head? Oh my God, it’s amazing.”
Stone went on to make a distinction between her own decision to cut her hair for the film, and the experience of her mother, Krista, who lost her hair while being treated for breast cancer in 2008. “She actually did something brave,” said Stone. “I’m just shaving my head.”
Jada Pinkett-Smith’s bald head was the subject of a joke made by Chris Rock at the 2022 Oscars, when he likened her look to GI Jane, played by Demi Moore in the military drama. It remains unclear whether Rock realised Pinkett-Smith has alopecia, but the joke caused her husband, Will Smith, to take to the stage and slap Rock, saying: “Take my wife’s name out of your fucking mouth.”
It led to Smith – who went on to win the Oscar for leading actor later that evening – being banned from Academy events for a decade.
Bugonia is on limited release in the US from 24 October and on general release from 31 October. It will be released in Australia on 30 October and the UK on 31 October.
