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‘Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch’ makes off with $66M at box office
By ANDREW DALTON, AP Entertain- ment Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) — You’re a mean one — and you’re number one — Mr. Grinch.
“Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch” sledded past mixed reviews and made off with $66 mil- lion for Universal Pictures to top the week- end North American box office, according to studio estimates Sunday.
Last week’s top film, the Queen biopic “Bohemian Rhapsody,” drops to second
for 20th Century Fox with a $30.8 million weekend that brings its overall take to $100 million.
Illumination, the Universal-owned animators behind “The Minions” and “Despicable Me,” produced the latest inter- pretation of Seuss’ 1957 book that led to a 1966 TV special and first came to the big screen as a live-action feature starring Jim Carrey in 2000.
Paramount Pictures’ war-horror hybrid “Overlord” was third in its first weekend with $10.1 million. Disney’s “The Nut- cracker and the Four Realms” brought
in $9.5 million and finished fourth in its second week. The weekend’s other major debut, “The Girl in the Spider’s Web,” made just $8 million and finished fifth.
Illumination’s “Grinch,” narrated by Pharrell Williams, gives the title charac- ter, voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch, a backstory in an orphanage and fills out the story of his foil Cindy Lou Who.
It’s the second Seuss adaptation for Illumination. Its version of “The Lorax” opened with a comparable $70 million weekend and went on to gross $348.8 million worldwide.
“The Grinch” was widely expected to be No. 1 with few other major openings this weekend, but it surpassed projections that had it bringing in closer to $60 million,
continuing what’s become a trend in 2018. “’The Grinch’ is just the latest in a string
of over-performers,” said Paul Dergarabe- dian, senior media analyst for Comscore. “’Bohemian Rhapsody’ was bigger than expected, ‘A Star Is Born’ was bigger than expected. It’s fueling a box-office surge.”
The industry has reached a cumulative box office total of $10 billion faster than in any other year, Dergarabedian said.
The Christmas theme of “The Grinch” could sustain it through the holidays and Universal hopes it has a longer life than that.
“With Thanksgiving coming, we’re poised to have a great run through that,” said Jim Orr, president of domestic dis- tribution for Universal. “Illumination’s created such a classic take on this beloved character that audiences will be enjoying it for a really long time.”
But big rivals loom soon, including “Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindel- wald” next week and “Ralph Breaks The Internet” on Nov. 21.
“We’ve got a lot of competition coming up for family audiences,” Dergarabedian said.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to comScore. Where available, the latest international numbers for Friday through Sunday also are included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.
1. “Dr Seuss’ The Grinch,” $66 million ($12.7 million international).
2. “Bohemian Rhapsody,” $30.8 million ($63 million international).
3. “Overlord,” $10.1 million, ($9.2 mil- lion international).
4. “The Nutcracker and the Four Realms,” $9.5 million, ($13.5 million inter- national).
5. “The Girl in the Spider’s Web,” $8 million, ($6.2 million international).
6. “A Star Is Born,” $8 million ($9 mil- lion international).
7. “Nobody’s Fool,” $6.5 million.
8. “Venom,” $4.8 million ($118.2 million international).
9. “Halloween,” $3.8 million ($5.9 mil- lion).
10. “The Hate U Give,” $2 million.
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Estimated ticket sales for Friday through
Sunday at international theaters (exclud- ing the U.S. and Canada), according to comScore:
1. “Venom,” $118.2 million.
2. “Bohemian Rhapsody,” $63 million. 3. “The Nutcracker and the Four
Realms,” $13.5 million.
4. “Dr Seuss’ The Grinch,” $12.7 million. 5. “Detective Conan: Zero the Enforcer,”
$12.4 million.
6. “Intimate Strangers,” $9.2 million. 7. “Overlord,” $9.2 million.
8. “A Star Is Born,” $9 million.
9. “The Girl in the Spider’s Web,” $6.2
million.
10. “Halloween,” $5.9 million.
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This story has been corrected to show
that “Overlord” earned $10.1 million, not $19 million.
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Follow Andrew Dalton on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/andyjamesdalton .
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