Saturday, May 11: Warner Bros.’ Detective Pikachu claimed first place on Friday with an estimated $20.7 million opening day, temporarily unseating Avengers: Endgame from the top spot — the first film to do since the latter opened two weeks ago. The Marvel pic will certainly return to first place on Saturday and Sunday.
Pikachu‘s debut is in line with final pre-release expectations, registering 2 percent ahead of Shazam!‘s $20.4 million opening day last month. The studio reports an audience share of 59 percent male and 51 percent over the age of 25 — while 73 percent were over the age of 18. Those splits may evolve over the weekend and weeks ahead as the older fan base likely drove initial business, but the film hopes to cater more toward young crowds from here on.
For the weekend, Boxoffice projects a $55 million debut in second place.
Avengers: Endgame Update
The Marvel epic added $16.06 million in its 15th day of release, lifting the domestic haul to $676.5 million. We’re projecting a third frame around $65 million, although models could skew a little higher depending on what effect Pikachu may or may not have had in terms of deflating Avengers‘ Friday performance.
With yesterday’s take, Endgame‘s 15-day total stands 35 percent ahead of where Infinity War ($502 million) was at the same point in time. It does, however, fall behind the pace of Force Awakens ($686.4 million) by slightly over 1 percent — the first time Endgame has lost ground on the daily tally of the biggest domestic release in history. This has been expected for some time, and Endgame remains on course to become the second biggest film in history by the time its run is over.
This weekend, Endgame will surpass Infinity War ($678.8 million) and Black Panther ($700.1 million) to land in third place all-time by the end of Sunday. It will then trail only Avatar ($760.5 million) and the aforementioned Force — which would make the latest MCU release the highest grossing comic book film in domestic history.
Other New Releases
Meanwhile, The Hustle got off to a solid start with $3.96 million on Friday — including pre-weekend earnings. The PG-13, female-driven remake of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels should benefit from Mother’s Day attendance over the weekend as we now project around $14 million through Sunday.
Poms opened in lukewarm fashion with $1.5 million yesterday, noticeably off from the $4.8 million first day of Book Club last year. Weekend projections stand around $5.5 million.
Last but not least, Tolkien came in a bit below expectations with $825K from its 1,495 locations. This weekend could register around $2.3 million.
Early domestic weekend estimates are below, to be followed by studio estimates on Sunday.
Early Weekend Estimates (Domestic)
FRI, MAY. 10 – SUN, MAY. 12
| # | TITLE | WEEKEND | LOCATIONS | AVG. | TOTAL | WKS. | DIST. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Avengers: Endgame | $65,000,000 | -56% | 4,662 | 0 | $13,943 | $725,445,739 | 3 | Disney |
| 2 | POKÉMON Detective Pikachu | $55,000,000 | — | 4,202 | — | $13,089 | $55,000,000 | 1 | Warner Bros. |
| 3 | The Hustle | $14,000,000 | — | 3,007 | — | $4,656 | $14,000,000 | 1 | United Artists Releasing |
| 4 | Long Shot | $6,500,000 | -33% | 3,230 | 0 | $2,012 | $20,111,935 | 2 | Lionsgate |
| 5 | The Intruder | $6,200,000 | -43% | 2,222 | 0 | $2,790 | $20,575,126 | 2 | Sony / Screen Gems |
| 6 | Poms | $5,500,000 | — | 2,750 | — | $2,000 | $5,500,000 | 1 | STX Entertainment |
| 7 | UglyDolls | $4,200,000 | -51% | 3,652 | 0 | $1,150 | $14,560,796 | 2 | STX Entertainment |
| 8 | Breakthrough | $2,600,000 | -33% | 1,902 | -982 | $1,367 | $37,240,806 | 4 | 20th Century Fox |
| 9 | Captain Marvel | $2,400,000 | -44% | 1,504 | -739 | $1,596 | $424,364,079 | 10 | Disney |
| 10 | Tolkien | $2,300,000 | — | 1,495 | — | $1,538 | $2,300,000 | 1 | Fox Searchlight |
| 11 | The Curse of La Llorona | $1,800,000 | -51% | 1,182 | -1358 | $1,523 | $51,400,031 | 4 | Warner Bros. / New Line |
| # | TITLE | WEEKEND | LOCATIONS | AVG. | TOTAL | WKS. | DIST. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Shazam! | $1,100,000 | -56% | 936 | -1585 | $1,175 | $137,168,798 | 6 | Warner Bros. |
| 2 | Dumbo | $625,000 | -59% | 837 | -831 | $747 | $110,880,289 | 7 | Walt Disney Pictures |
| 3 | Little (2019) | $580,000 | -59% | 586 | -773 | $990 | $39,603,700 | 5 | Universal Pictures |
| 4 | Student of the Year 2 | $550,000 | — | 190 | — | $2,895 | $550,000 | 1 | FIP |
| 5 | Penguins | $325,000 | -1% | 285 | -767 | $1,140 | $7,247,984 | 4 | Disney / Disneynature |
| 6 | Us (2019) | $265,000 | -46% | 266 | -333 | $996 | $174,422,380 | 8 | Universal Pictures |
| 7 | Pet Sematary | $230,000 | -54% | 304 | -351 | $757 | $54,205,700 | 6 | Paramount Pictures |
| 8 | How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World | $160,000 | -7% | 187 | -58 | $856 | $160,157,730 | 15 | Universal / DreamWorks Animation |
| 9 | Hellboy | $40,000 | -42% | 127 | -52 | $315 | $21,871,956 | 5 | Lionsgate / Summit |
| # | TITLE | WEEKEND | LOCATIONS | AVG. | TOTAL | WKS. | DIST. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tyler Perry’s A Madea Family Funeral | $52,000 | -17% | 89 | -9 | $584 | $73,231,172 | 11 | Lionsgate |
| 2 | Five Feet Apart | $33,000 | -57% | 87 | -66 | $379 | $45,578,417 | 9 | CBS Films |
| 3 | Faith, Hope & Love | $2,000 | 4% | 5 | 3 | $400 | $199,414 | 9 | ArtAffects Entertainment |
Friday, May 10: Warner Bros. reports this morning that Detective Pikachu took in an estimated $5.7 million from Thursday night’s first shows domestically, setting the stage for a strong debut this weekend.
By comparison, Pikachu registered just 3 percent behind Shazam!‘s $5.9 million Thursday night start (which excludes pre-Thursday Fandango screening gross of $3.325 million). The DC movie from Warner went on to a $53.5 million debut weekend.
Overseas, Pikachu opened in 31 new markets on Thursday and generated a total international daily gross of $5.8 million. The overseas total from 38 markets thus far stands at $20.7 million, including Japan. An additional 24 markets open today, including Spain, United Kingdom, China, and Mexico.
The Hustle opened to a reported $774K pre-Friday, also a solid start for the female-leaning remake hoping to draw audiences over Mother’s Day weekend. The number includes both Thursday night shows and special Wednesday sneaks, coming in 11 percent ahead of Life of the Party ($700K) — which also opened on Mother’s Day weekend one year ago on its way to $17.9 million opening weekend.
Tolkien reportedly earned $240K from Thursday night shows beginning at 6pm. This excludes earnings from the Fathom Events screening earlier in the week.
Last among Thursday night openers, Poms brought in $225K last night. That’s 64 percent behind the $625K start of Book Club last year, however, it’s not an apples-to-apples comparison since that title debuted one week after Mother’s Day. We expect Poms to attract the bulk of its opening weekend business on Saturday and Sunday.
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