During the course of a record Thanksgiving weekend, Universal’s Wicked: Part One has become the highest grossing movie ever at the domestic box office based on a Broadway musical.
Through yesterday, the Jon M. Chu-directed, Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande-starring feature counts $214.3M in the midst of its second weekend, defeating the lifetime gross of Paramount’s 1978 classic Grease.
By Sunday, Wicked is expected to reach just under $263M.
Worldwide with $358M and counting by Sunday, Wicked will stand as the fourth highest grossing movie based on a Broadway musical after Mamma Mia! ($611.2M), Les Miserables ($442.7M) and Grease ($396.2M). Wicked was always perceived to be chiefly domestic-driven at the B.O.
With a running time of two hours and 40 minutes to Moana 2‘s 100 minutes, some box office sources believed that Wicked would hit a buzzsaw in the Dwayne Johnson-Auli’i Cravalho sequel, but the two heavy female demo movies (70%-plus) co-existed wonderfully. While Disney’s Moana 2 is notching the best five-day opening of all time and Thanksgiving with $215M-$220M, Wicked with a projected $118M is the third best over the Wednesday-Sunday holiday behind Moana 2 and Disney’s 2019 Frozen 2 ($125M holiday holdover take).
Wicked also notched the third best Black Friday box office for any title, behind Moana 2‘s $54.5M and Frozen 2‘s $34.1M.
Wicked in its opening weekend, broke a slew of records, including but not limited to, the best opening stateside ($112.5M) and worldwide ($162.5M) debut for a movie based on a Broadway musical. In addition, the Stephen Schwartz and Winnie Holzman musical delivered the best openings ever for Chu, Grande and Erivo at the domestic and global box office.
Among all live-action musicals at the domestic box office, Wicked has a way to go to bust into the top 5, a list that’s led by Warner Bros’ Barbie ($636.2M), Disney’s live-action takes on The Lion King ($543.6M), Beauty and the Beast ($504.4M), The Jungle Book ($364M) and Aladdin ($355.5M).