The Chosen’s latest season enjoyed an impressive launch in Brazil last week and celebrated its worldwide success with a stunning nighttime projection onto the Christ the Redeemer monument showcasing various clips and photos from the series.
Season 4: Episodes 1 and 2 opened on 1,000 screeners and drew 275,000 moviegoers, an increase of more than 300 percent compared to the Season 3 launch in 2023.
It was No. 2 at the Brazil box office for the weekend.
Brazil is No. 2 in worldwide viewership of The Chosen, ranking only behind the United States.
The series’ official social media page said the projection onto the Christ the Redeemer monument was a “public display of affection for a nation who’s welcomed The Chosen with open arms.” The projection was done in partnership with the Archdiocese of São Sebastião do Rio de Janeiro.
The Chosen has been viewed by more than 200 million people worldwide.
The well-known statue was completed in 1931 after five years of construction and stands 98 feet tall, according to Crux, a Catholic news site. It was entirely financed by the Archdiocese of Rio de Janeiro and donors, and it rests atop Corcovado Mountain. A chapel is located at the foot of the monument. It is considered one of the seven wonders of the modern world.
Actors Jonathan Roumie (who portrays Jesus), Paras Patel (Matthew) and Lara Silva (Eden) traveled to Brazil to attend “teal carpet” premieres in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. The projection onto the Christ the Redeemer monument took place during the Rio premier.
Elizabeth Tabish, who portrays Mary Magdalene, told Christians Headlines the global reach of the series still amazes her. It is popular, she said, because people are looking for “stories of hope.”
“This is a global phenomenon where people from all these different cultures are reacting to it in a really similar way,” she said.
“We meet these characters before they meet Jesus and they are messy, and they are lost and they are lonely,” Tabish added. “...So to see the process and the change and the growth from meeting Jesus is just so beautiful.”
Images credit: The Chosen
Michael Foust has covered the intersection of faith and news for 20 years. His stories have appeared in Baptist Press, Christianity Today, The Christian Post, the Leaf-Chronicle, the Toronto Star and the Knoxville News-Sentinel.