Madagascar rules the box office
Father and son comedy, musical bombs on Father’s Day weekend
LOS ANGELES — Zoo animals remain hot at the box office. Singing stars and Adam Sandler are not.
Ben Stiller and his voice co- stars of Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted held on to the No. 1 spot again, with $ 35.5 million for the animated sequel’s second weekend in domestic theatres.
Studio estimates Sunday put Ridley Scott’s sci- fi adventure Prometheus at No. 2 again with $ 20.2 million.
Madagascar 3 and Prometheus held off two underachieving newcomers. The star- studded musical Rock of Ages, whose cast includes Tom Cruise, Catherine Zeta- Jones and Alec Baldwin, flopped at No. 3 with $ 15.1 million.
Sandler’s That’s My Boy bombed with $ 13 million, the worst showing for one of his broad comedies since the mid1990s. That’s My Boy came in at No. 5, behind the $ 13.8 million for Snow White & the Huntsman, a film that’s been out for three weekends.
“Sure, we would have liked to have done more,” said Rory Bruer, head of distribution at Sony, which released That’s My Boy and most of Sandler’s past movies. “But you’ve got to give it to Adam. He mixes it up. This is a really off- the- wall comedy.”
That’s My Boy stars Sandler as a guy who became a fleeting teen celebrity after getting his seventh- grade teacher pregnant and now is a middle- aged loser trying to reconnect with his son ( Andy Samberg).
As with most Sandler movies, the reviews were bad, but that usually does not stop his audience. The R rating for That’s My Boy may have cut into the movie’s business though, prohibiting those under 17 from seeing it without an adult.
Among Sandler’s mainstream live- action comedies, it was the worst debut since 1996’ s Happy Gilmore, which played in far fewer theatres than That’s My Boy and came as Sandler was just climbing to stardom. And factoring in today’s higher admission prices, That’s My Boy sold fewer tickets than Happy Gilmore.
Warner Bros. had its own dud with Rock of Ages, adapted from the stage show built around 1980s rock hits and featuring an ensemble that includes Cruise, Zeta- Jones, Baldwin, Julianne Hough and Mary J. Blige.
Dan Fellman, the studio’s head of distribution, was not ready to pull the plug on the movie, saying he hoped it might hang on in subsequent weekends. “Musicals, there have been a couple in the summer like Hairspray and Mamma Mia!, that tend to have good holding power as counterprogramming. We’re hoping we can get back on track,” Fellman said.
Rock of Ages added $ 4.1 million in a handful of overseas markets.