Jason Reitman’s ‘Saturday Night’ Pops In Limited Opening That’s Best In Months, In Top Two For Year – Specialty Box Office
Columbia Pictures’ Saturday Night from Jason Reitman debuted at $265k, a great $53k per theater that’s the second-best limited opening of the year, and the best since June when Kinds Of Kindness also opened in 5 theaters (to a $75k PTA). It’s been a long a slightly dower wait for something to pop.
Saturday Night made $108K on Friday, $88K on Saturday and a projected $69K on Sunday in LA (AMC Century City, AMC The Grove, AMC Burbank) and New York (AMC Lincoln Square, Alamo Brooklyn). Expands Oct. 4 before opening wide on Oct 11 and looks well set up for a nice theatrical run with strong reviews and word of mouth since premiering at Telluride and Toronto.
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Saturday Night is the true, and real time, story of what happened behind the scenes in the 90 minutes leading up to the first broadcast of Saturday Night Live at 11:30 pm on October 11, 1975. A ferocious troupe of young comedians and writers made history that night, changing television, and culture.
The film stars, in order of appearance, Gabriel LaBelle, Rachel Sennott, Cory Michael Smith, Ella Hunt, Dylan O’Brien, Emily Fairn, Matt Wood, Lamorne Morris, Kim Matula, Finn Wolfhard, Nicholas Braun, Cooper Hoffman, Andrew Barth Feldman, Kaia Gerber, Tommy Dewey, Willem Dafoe, Matthew Rhys and J.K. Simmons. Jon Batiste and Naomi McPherson round out the ensemble .
Written by Reitman Gil Kenan and Reitman. Produced by Jason Blumenfeld, Peter Rice, Jason Reitman and Gil Kenan. Executive Producers are Erica Mills and JoAnn Perritano.
Moderate-wide releases: Another hit from India. Prathyangira Cinemas released Telugu Indian action epic Devara Part 1 at 1,040 theaters for a weekend debut of $5.12 million, according to Comscore, and a no. 4 stop in the weekend’s top ten for the film directed by Koratala Siva.
My Old Ass Amazon MGM Studios grossed $2.2 million at 1,390 locations in a major week 3 expansion for the Megan Park-directed coming of age comedy starring Maisy Stella and Aubrey Plaza. It’s no. 8 on the top 10 and has a cume through Sunday of $2.85 million.
Biopic Lee from Roadside Attractions, the fascinating story of supermodel turned seminal World War II photographer Lee Miller, is looking at an opening weekend gross of $723k on 854 screens. The film by Ellen Kouras is produced by and stars Kate Winslet.
SDG Releasing’s Vindicating Trump by Dinesh D’Souza is at $762k at 813 locations. The right-wing pundit and conspiracy theorist’s look at the political, legal, and attempted-assassination obstacles faced by Donald Trump in his quest to retake the White House falls far short of conservative podcaster Matt Walsh’s Am I Racist?, which did a $1.1 million weekend for a cume of over $11 million in week 3.
IFC Films’ horror Azrael starring Samara Weaving opened to $300k at 754 theaters. Directed by E.L. Katz.
A bit wider, Demi Moore-starring The Substance from indie distributor Mubi is having a $1.8 million weekend on 1,712 screens for a new estimated cume of $6.86 million in week 2 and a no. 10 spot for the body-horror pic by Coralie Fargeat.
“Audiences are continuing to drop their jaws and talk about one of the best-received genre films of the year,” Mubi said, noting an an excellent 44% weekend-to-weekend drop (33% when taking out last week’s sneaks).
Sony Pictures Classics’ 10th anniversary re-release of Damien Chazelle’s Whiplash saw $60k on 191 screens for a two-week cume of $861k.
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