Les Mis set to be highest grossing movie musical of all time.

[Plum]

Eh, why get so fixated on rank? As long as it makes a healthy profit and maybe gets a few Oscar nominations, it'll go down as a musical that was worthwhile to its studio. Those are rare enough.

[Joviedamian]

Plum, I agree. I am just tired of people getting their hopes up!

[metropolis10111]

I agree too, I'm just getting into the spirit of the thread. Since it's about the movie becoming the #1 all time movie musical.

[DAME]

^
Funny how some of the nay sayers are changing their tune. Like we can't go back and read.

[best12bars]

$48.8 million (domestic gross so far) after Friday's estimates came in.

EDIT: I think it's safe to say it's going to brush past my initial upper-end estimate of $60 million in its first week. It still has Saturday, Sunday, and Monday grosses to add in before it finishes out Week #1. Normally, Sunday and Monday grosses fall way off, but this being another holiday weekend, they could almost be as strong as Friday or Saturday night. We shall see, but this is a solid showing for a first week of any film, let alone a musical.

[best12bars]

It's kinda sad (or maybe pathetic?) that "Les Miz" grossed more than the entire theatrical release of "Nine" ($19.6 million) after its second day.

"Les Miz" will easily pass the total domestic grosses for both Phantom of the Opera ($51.2 million) and Sweeney Todd ($52.8 million) after today's intake is added in.

Still a a ways off from Dreamgirls, Hairspray, and the modern-day champs Mamma Mia! and Chicago, but it's well on its way to being right up there.

[little_sally]

Re: Nine: makes sense, considering it's not such as recognizable name to the general public. That, and it was a terrible movie.

[best12bars]

Hindsight is 20/20, as they say, but here's a few reasons I think "Nine" tanked and why I think "Les Miz" did it right (at least from the "money" angle):

BAD: "Nine" is not an instantly recognizable title. It has no hit songs or pop standards from it. It's not widely produced by community theatres, high schools, colleges, or even summer stock theatres. The general public wasn't aware of it.

GOOD: "Les Miz" is known on some level by the general public, even if they've never seen it. They know the original novel and perhaps even the basic plot. They may even have been "forced" to read it (or parts of it) in a classroom. They might know "I Dreamed a Dream" because of Susan Boyle. And the musical was/is a mega-hit, so they might have seen a production of it, professional or amateur.

BAD: "Nine" loaded up with movie stars, many of them Oscar-winners or nominees, but few of them had ever starred in or carried a huge blockbuster hit film.

GOOD: "Les Miz" loaded up with a Blockbuster cast, including Wolverine, Gladiator, and Cat Woman at the top of the heap, followed by a star from an actual hit movie musical (Mamma Mia!) and Borat and Belatrix from the Harry Potter movies.

BAD: "Nine" opened with mixed reviews (at best), but it also opened in limited release (just 4 theatres), allowing for an equally mixed word of mouth to spread in the bigger cities before it went into wide release and tanked.

GOOD: "Les Miz" opened with mixed reviews, but it also opened in wide release on Christmas Day in 2,808 theatres.

[little_sally]

It's hurts me when people blame the failure on Nine on the source material and the score (I don't mean you best12bars, I mean generally). I think the score is some of the most beautiful music ever written for the stage. Rob Marshall just didn't know what to do with the source material.

[JP2]

Per Deadline:

"Tom Hooper’s musical crosses $100 million worldwide today. Playing this weekend in 8 international territories — Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Hungary and Spain – its overseas gross is now $36.6M. Combined with the U.S. total of $68M expected by Sunday, the worldwide cume should be $115.7M by then."

[tazber]

Possibly slipping to 3rd for the weekend, but still very robust!

Also, according to boxofficeguru.com it took Mamma Mia twice as long to reach $68 million.

After three days on top, Les Miserables sank into third place with $9.4 million on Friday. Due to upfront excitement from passionate fans, Universal’s musical drama, which earned an “A” CinemaScore grade, had already earned about $40 million heading into the frame, and a likely $28 million frame will bring its total to a hugely impressive $68 million since its release on Christmas day.




Friday estimates

[bk]

Deadline is a site for fools. The film is doing very well - people really think it will pass The Sound of Music as the highest grossing musical of all time? Dream on, Cinderella. Just adjust for dollars and nothing will beat The Sound of Music - ever. When you adjust the original gross for inflation it come in at over one billion dollars. Even if you don't adjust, it's 158 million on a budget of 8.2 million.

[tazber]

^^^^

It's true. Sound of Music even beats Avatar when adjusted for inflation.

But it doesn't really matter. What matters is that Les Miz is already a success and is shaping up to be a smash.

With little to no competition in January, excellent word of mouth (see its cinemascore) and Oscar nominations still to come it's poised to have a very profitable theatrical run.

[JP2]

"Deadline is a site for fools."

How is the most reputable and popular Hollywood trade a 'site for fools'?

No one ever said Les Miz was going to top any adjusted gross, but at this point $200 million in the US alone is not out of reach.

[best12bars]

I know "box office records" are extremely important for promoting and gloating, but the bottom line is that movies just aren't drawing the crowds they did a few decades ago, and don't even come close to what they did before television.

And truly, it's all beside the point ... because Avatar and Titanic and Les Miserables don't have to compete against Gone With the Wind or The Sound of Music.

They only really have to do well on today's terms, against today's films, with today's dollars at stake. Not yesterday's.

So "all time blah-blah" is really a lie. Did the movie do well and make the studio money and knock (enough of) the other current movies aside to win your choice as "the movie you want to see?"

Regardless of what you think or critic's think of Les Miz, a movie musical becoming one of the year's "big hits" means that more movie musicals will be considered for production. It's no guarantee, but it shows producers and studios that it is possible, with the right property and the right people involved, to yield a big success with a musical.

Chicago did it. Mamma Mia! did it. And now, Les Miz is well on its way.

For that alone, I say, "Yay, team!"

[WestEndAndy]

I haven't seen the film yet, but I expect it to gross well over a billion worldwide, maybe over 2 billion.
Les Mis is just not like any other movie musical. You are talking about the most successful musical in the history of the world. It has much more appeal than even Mamma Mia or The Sound of Music. They are both enjoyable confections, whereas by all accounts this is as much of a blockbuster as the stage show.

Laugh now, while you can.

[StageManager2]

I haven't seen the film yet, but I expect it to gross well over a billion worldwide, maybe over 2 billion.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[The Scorpion]

Les Mis is just not like any other movie musical. You are talking about the most successful musical in the history of the world.

You'd think that'd be enough to seal its place in the top spot, but it isn't necessarily. For a start, the most financially successful musical in history (as per the Guinness Book of Records and Cameron Mackintosh's own press team) is not Miz but Phantom (Miz trumps Phantom in terms of number of places performed, though). And we all know how...er..."well" the film of that show did, although of course it didn't help that the film was pretty much a travesty.

But Miz is definitely getting a lot more positive buzz and, indeed, buzz generally than the Phantom film ever did. It helps it has A-list stars and major studio backing. Seeing the trailer in the cinema yesterday (it's not out in the UK till mid-January) was genuinely exciting as it got everyone talking in anticipation. And the TV spots and posters are everywhere.

[metropolis10111]

While the move will make money there is NO way it is going toe be the highest grossing movie musical of all time. Once again next weekend will the the true test to it's staying power. If it can go over $20million next weekend it has a chance to be in the top but even beating Chicago will be quite a challenge.

[RooMcGoo]

Check out my deconstruction of Les Mis' success

An Incomplete History of Les Miserables

[JP2]

That was actually hilarious.

[metropolis10111]

It was better then the movie ...lol

[morosco]

[TheatreFan4]

So they've already made more than their budget, which I know still means it has to go well above that to even break even but it hasn't even opened in the UK yet where it's sure to have a very high box office there.

[JP2]

The industry myth is 'double the budget', so this would have to make about 120 million to break even, which it will have done by Monday/Tuesday.

[TheatreFan4]

I thought it was double the budget to get the ACTUAL budget including marketing?