Comedy is king for 1st time in 2 years
NEW YORK » For the first time in more than two years, a straight-up comedy is No. 1 at the box office. Kevin Hart and Tiffany Haddish’s “Night School” debuted with $28 million in ticket sales, according to estimates Sunday.
The race for the weekend top spot was, in the end, a laugher. Warner Bros.’ animated release “Smallfoot,” which cost about $80 million to make, trailed in second with $23 million.
Not since Melissa McCarthy’s “The Boss” topped the box office in April 2016 has a comedy that didn’t mix other genre elements been No. 1.
Big-screen comedy has been in a tailspin for years. It took two of comedy’s biggest names teaming up to push Universal’s “Night School” to the year’s best comedy opening.
Frights have become the hotter attraction at the movies, but for this weekend, horror and comedy switched roles. Lionsgate’s Halloween-themed “Hell Fest” debuted meekly with $5.1 million.
“Over the last few years, comedy has just taken a real roller coaster ride, with audiences either not locking into the premise or not vibing with the stars,” said Paul Dergarabedian, analyst for comScore. “The quality, or at least the perceived quality, of many of the movies, especially the R-rated comedies, has been so bad that time after time people got disenchanted by the genre.”
David Lowery’s “The Old Man & the Gun,” which Robert Redford has said will be his final film as an actor, opened in five theaters, scoring a perscreen average of $30,000. Redford plays an aging bank robber in the heist film co-starring Sissy Spacek and Casey Affleck.