What are verified examples of film studios or third parties paying for audience members at screenings?

1. Studios pay market‑research firms to recruit and compensate test audiences

Major studios routinely hire specialist research companies—most notably Nielsen NRG—to recruit, run and sometimes compensate participants for test screenings, with studios spending “millions of dollars per year” on those services and firms using promotions and signups at theaters and malls to get participants ^[1]. The arrangement is transactional: studios contract outside firms to handle everything from logistics to questionnaires, and the firms’ recruitment methods include paid incentives or promotions that can amount to direct payment or ticket stipends for targeted demographics ^[1].

2. Private screening rooms and rentals are a direct studio expense that effectively buys an audience environment

Filmmakers and studios rent private screening rooms and pay hourly fees for curated, invite‑only audiences; the Charles Aidikoff Screening Room, used by Hollywood insiders, rents for $300–$500 per hour and is regularly booked for screenings of works in progress and Academy viewings—an explicit studio/producer expense to stage a controlled audience experience ^{[2] [5]}. Those rentals aren’t payments to individual audience members, but they are direct costs the production or studio pays to secure an audience whose reactions can influence editing and awards campaigns ^[2].

3. Advance screenings: studios buy seats or sell blocks via corporate partners to seed attendance and early box office

Studios have also engaged partners to deliver audiences to advance screenings; for example, Amazon/Prime tie‑ups allowed Prime members to purchase advance screening seats for Sony titles like Jumanji and Hotel Transylvania 3, where Deadline estimated Sony grossed roughly $2 million and $1.2 million respectively from those pre‑release events—an approach that can function like a studio‑subsidised event when distribution and partner pricing create guaranteed attendance ^[3]. That model shows studios using corporate distribution channels and ticketing platforms to underwrite early turnout even when seats are paid for by members, because studios and partners share incentives to create an event atmosphere ^[3].

4. Free or comped passes—studios and PR firms give away tickets to shape word‑of‑mouth

For public advance screenings aimed at publicity rather than formal testing, studios and PR shops distribute free tickets through services such as Gofobo and other promotional outlets; these are explicitly intended to create positive buzz and social‑media word‑of‑mouth, and studios openly give away passes to members of the public for this purpose ^[4]. Consumer guides note studios regularly offer these free passes and that attendees are often asked to provide feedback afterward, which blurs the line between pure publicity and informal audience research ^[4].

5. What the records do not show — and why framing matters

Reporting confirms multiple verified mechanisms—paid research firms, rented screening rooms, partner‑driven advance sales, and free PR giveaways—by which studios or third parties secure audiences, but sources do not provide a catalogue of instances where studios handed out cash at the door to random moviegoers as a common practice; instead, expenditures are typically routed through vendors, venues or promotional partners ^{[1] [2] [3] [4]}. The difference matters because critics who claim studios “pay people to clap” often conflate compensated, targeted test audiences or invite‑only screenings with ordinary public showings; the documented incentives are strategic and mediated rather than simple direct payment for attendance ^{[1] [2]}.