EXCLUSIVE: Sources tell us tonight that the John Wick spinoff, Ballerina, is looking to do around $3.5M-$4M in previews. That’s all in, including Wednesday fan screenings which started at 7PM as well as Thursday showtimes which began at 6PM.
The hope is that the $80M-$90M Lionsgate production gets to north of $30M, which as we told you, is around where recent female solo action movies openings live at the box office, read Furiosa ($26.3M 3-day) and 2019’s Alita: Battle Angel ($28.5M 3-day).
The Len Wiseman directed, Thunder Road produced spinoff is expected to rank second behind Disney’s third weekend of Lilo & Stitch which is looking to make around $35M; that movie crossing $300M today.
Ballerina was delayed a year to undergo additional photography.
Upside on Ballerina, is that Thursday night fans are enjoying the Ana de Armas, Keanu Reeves cameo movie with a 94% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes — that’s as of this minute, higher than any John Wick RT popcorn score, John Wick: Chapter 4 received a 93%. Critically, even though Ballerina is 72% certified fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, it’s not as high as the John Wick movies, which had film review scores ranging from 86% to 94% certified fresh.
Ballerina‘s all-in preview cash is on par with the Thursday preview box office of Furiosa ($3.5M) and it’s higher than the $2.4M Tuesday night preview cash of Alita: Battle Angel. Essentially, the thinking is to comp Ballerina to female solo action movies instead of John Wick movies. Female solo action movies are a completely different subgenre and don’t always attract the full-on male audience which typically attends a male leading star action movie.
Still, Ballerina‘s combined preview cash is higher than the Thursday night of John Wick 2 ($2.2M), but far under both John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum ($5.9M) and John Wick: Chapter 4 ($8.9M, best preview cash in franchise).
We’ll have more updates as they happen tomorrow morning. Lionsgate didn’t return request for comment.