Seth MacFarlane’s Ted, the stripper flick Magic Mike and Madea’s Witness Protection helped push the North American box office to a new June record take of $206 million, which is roughly 5% ahead of a year ago this time when the third Transformers earned a massive $115 million. The fourth wide debut of the weekend, the Dreamworks family drama People Like Us, was DOA right out of the gate. With Sony’s anticipated superhero flick The Amazing Spider-Man debuting on Tuesday, the box office could see its good fortune climb even higher.
In the meantime, it was an Amazingly Profane Teddy Bear that was raking in the most coin after jumping into June from July when G.I. Joe: Retaliation was yanked into 2013. Universal’s R-rated comedy Ted opened on 3,239 screens Friday and went on to earn a great $54.1 million for an excellent per-screen average of over $16,700. The film marks the big-screen writing/directing debut of Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane and stars Mark Wahlberg, Mila Kunis and MacFarlane, who provided the voice of the title character. Feedback from both the nation’s critics (69% Rotten Tomatoes rating) and ticket buyers (an ‘A-‘ CinemaScore rating) was largely on the positive side, which should help the $50 million production sail past the $100 million mark in a couple of weeks.
Ted’s opening ranks as the third best ever for an R-rated comedy, right behind The Hangover Part II and the first Sex and the City movie. As many fans of MacFarlane’s television work headed out to see the movie on opening day, the film suffered a modest 13.4% drop on its second day out (for comparison, the original Hangover also eased roughly 10% on its second day of release).
Ted wasn’t the only R-rated comedy to make a big debut this weekend. The Steven Soderbergh male stripper flick Magic Mike danced up a great $39.1 million in its first three days from 2,930 theaters, for an eye-opening per screen average of $13,363. The Warner Brothers release starring Channing Tatum and Matthew McConaughey opened strongly on Friday with an estimated $19.4 million thanks to a strong turnout of females who made opening day a bit of an event. This may explain the steep 41% slide experienced on Saturday, a sizable drop usually reserved for horror films or sequels. But with a production budget of $7 million, Warners, Soderbergh and company can’t be too worried. After three days, the critically-acclaimed comedy has already earned its money back and then some.
In third place for the weekend was last weekend’s number one film, the Disney/Pixar 3D princess flick Brave. Like the film’s main character Merida, the movie held its own against the big boy arrivals of Mark, Channing and Tyler as the popular 3D animated feature eased an acceptable 49% from its big opening last weekend. Still at a wide 4,164 theater count, Brave earned an estimated $34 million to bring its ten-day total to the $131.7 million mark. The film should continue to earn big bucks until the arrival of the latest Ice Age film arrives on July 13.
In fourth place was the latest comedy from Tyler Perry to feature his popular alter-ego Madea, Madea’s Witness Protection. This is the first time that Perry has released a film in the summertime and the results were largely in line with his springtime releases. The comedy debuted at 2,101 theaters and earned a solid $26.4 million in its first three days and a nice per-screen average of $12,193. Like Perry’s other features, the production costs were low ($20 million for Witness Protection) and the film should nab a tidy profit during its quick theatrical run.
Rounding out the top five was a more successful Dreamworks feature Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted. The popular 3D sequel was off 40% from last weekend and earned an additional $11.8 million from 3,715 theaters to bring its domestic total to the $180 million mark. Pre-inflation adjustment, the movie will pass the 2008 sequel’s final tally on Monday and is poised to zip past the 2005 original’s haul of $191 million within the next week or so. Madagascar 3 should finish its run with a solid $215 million in domestic sales.
The remainder of the top ten was as follows:
6. Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (Fox) $6 million (-63%); $29 million
7. Prometheus (Fox) $4.9 million (-50%); $118.2 million
8. Moonrise Kingdom (Focus Features) $4.8 million (+43%); $18.5 million
9. Snow White and the Huntsman (Universal) $4.4 million (-45%) $145.5 million
The fourth opening of the weekend, the Disney/Dreamworks drama People Like Us starring Chris Pine (Star Trek) and Elizabeth Banks (The Hunger Games) sputtered out of the gate and landed in tenth place with a dismal $4.3 million from 2,055 theaters, good enough to barely squeak into the top ten.
The Amazing Spider-Man will help kick-start the Fourth of July holiday weekend with a 4,000 screen debut on Tuesday, while Paramount’s music documentary Katy Perry: Part of Me arrives on Thursday from Paramount and the Oliver Stone drug-trafficking drama Savages sets up shop starting next Friday.
– Shawn Fitzgerald
