First weekend of May 2026

I was a little worried going into last weekend and coming into this weekend, we needed both Michael and The Devil Wears Prada 2 to perform on the very high edge of possibilities to counter the leggy films we had in the marketplace last year (Sinners, Minecraft), but both have come through and then some. I figured last week was going to be down about 5% from last year, but because Michael had such a good Saturday last weekend, we ended up about 5%. Unless Michael completely falls apart this weekend, which at this point it doesn’t look like it, we should add another $15 million or so (about 10% ahead of this weekend last year) to the cushion. Next weekend should be even better, because last year was driven by week #2 of a Marvel (which held up pretty good for a Marvel, but by nature they are smash and grab), and we only had about $8 million of new title gross coming in. Next week we have 3 decent films coming in and we should add another $30 million to the cushion over last year, however the mismatch will be the next week where we’re light on new title gross but have to contend with Final Destination last year.

But after next weekend, we should be way behind last year for a couple of weeks, because we’ve got nothing to counter the 1, 2, 3 punch of Final Destination, Lilo & Stitch and Mission Impossible (and last year, Memorial Day Weekend was the highest grossing Memorial Day ever); and even though the new film’s gross coming in post Memorial Day should be pretty similar to what came in last year, the difference will be those Memorial Day holdovers. Once we get to Father’s Day, we should be in pretty good shape for a couple of weeks, and there are a couple of weeks where we’ll have to see how similar the box-office shadow some of these big IP’s will cast, Superman vs Moana for instance.

There’s an old saying in this business; the three greatest lies are ‘The Check is in the Mail’, ‘Let’s definitely have Lunch’* and ‘We’re getting a Theatrical Release from Netflix’. Today Netflix announced that Narnia is moving to next February, and is getting a ‘full theatrical release’ with a window till April. Exactly what does that mean? Is it a Theatrical Release or a Netflix Theatrical release, because one goes to one place (we give a shit, and we want you to watch it in a theater) and one goes to another place (we don’t give a shit, and we’d really rather you watch it on TV). And history tells us that Netflix won’t spend any money on this and will act like they are almost ashamed it’s in theaters.

But let’s say it’s the first one and they are going to spend enough money where they get people to see it in theaters (and act like it), and they report the grosses; exactly how are they going to do that? Because you don’t just flip a switch, Theatrical is really hard, it’s kind of like the difference between saying ‘let’s have a High Speed train from LA to SF’ and actually doing it. They don’t have the infrastructure or the personnel to do it, but the thing they really are lacking is the culture to do it.

Unfortunately, the culture at Netflix is one of mediocrity, and it’s pretty shocking that they’ve made piles and piles of money with a culture of mediocrity (and maybe that’s just as much a reflection of the consumer as it is for Netflix). From Development to Production to Marketing (and everything in between), the bar of quality is built around being ‘good enough that they don’t turn it off’, and you don’t really have to create something great because it’s all about the Home Page Algorithm. And that’s not what Theatrical is, you come up through a system where a B+ idea gets you thrown out of the meeting. We saw that Culture of Mediocrity over the last 6 months where Netflix punted the salad on the day they ‘won’ the bidding for WB. By not having a press release out immediately saying they were buying WB to get into businesses that they weren’t in, but felt the need to be in (like Theatrical). By the time they said it a couple of days later the bomb had gone off and no one believed them. And then for the next 4 months Skydance ran circles around them with their messaging and work. And that’s the difference between a company that knows how to do something hard and a company that is making content that’s ‘just good enough that you don’t turn it off’. It will be interesting to see what this looks like in February next year.

Anyway, with the same expected accuracy as the California Post, where a bunch of Brits and Aussies take time out from telling us what’s up with the Royals, London, Sydney and what’s terrible about New York to tell us what’s terrible about California, here are some thoughts on the weekend box-office.

The Devil Wears Prada 2 - This is another nice step forward for the 20th division at Disney, and along with Avatar, Predator and Alien they’re getting open films based on IP that came over with the sale. Clearly they’ve still got to find a footing with original IP, but good box-office is good box-office and the numbers here are very very good. This is going to be very interesting to watch over the weekend, because this type of movie is very specific in its demo appeal, and we’ll have to see how deep this audience goes. As someone who only owns 6 pairs of shoes (and I really only wear 3) and haven’t changed the way I dress since I was 12**, the same subject matter that’s going to generate 3, maybe 4 viewings this weekend from some of my friends is a ‘maybe on a plane…if I don’t have a lot of work to do’ for me***. The main issue here is the core audience, and for this movie is older Females, and they are planners. We’ve seen this in the past with films like Barbie where the pre-sales were trending towards a gross that was about 20% higher than what it actually ended up with, because there was very little walk up business. And we’re already seeing that in the grosses today. It started the day dead even with where Michael started last Friday but it’s already 10% behind it now. The big difference between the two is that the bulk of the Prada demo are those ‘planners’, they buy their tickets in advance and rarely go to a show after 7pm; and a very small portion of the audience says they are going to the 7pm show but a bunch of stuff happens and they end up at the 9:45 show. It was the reverse with Michael last week so we won’t see the big growth at night here like we saw with Michael last Friday. Michael also had a really nice day last Saturday, and the early attender FOMO aspect to this audience usually translates to a flat or down Saturday. Since opening day yesterday was about 80% of Michael’s opening day, I’ll say that the trend continues through the weekend, which should put this in the mid/high 70s. But that depends on this matching Michael’s good Saturday, and if it doesn’t it could end up much closer to 70.

Michael - Sometimes these Musical Biopics can run through an audience pretty quickly; but a few hang around for a while and it looks like the water cooler discussion about this film, as well as the core audience really liking it, is generating really good week 2 numbers. As good a job as Lionsgate did in getting this film open last week, they did something just as important this week; in the face of Prada opening today, they held on to a good share of the PLF’s and that one aspect is going to give this a nice hold. It’s only down a couple more points than Bohemian Rhapsody was on Friday #2, but Bohemian had a really good 2nd Saturday and Sunday (which is especially good since it was up against a similar gross as Prada with The Grinch) and Bohemian only ended up down 39% in week 2. This should end up a decent amount behind that, mostly because it will be missing a bigger Thursday gross, and figure it’s down 55% or so for a weekend in the mid/low 40’s.

Hokum - Went 1800 runs and has some really solid numbers in the big city and upscale theaters, looks like a weekend in the mid 4’s.

Animal Farm - Andy Serkis’s animated retelling of the Classic Orwell book, which is a weird match considering the book is pretty hard core for a film that looks like a kids film, and (even weirder) is being released by Angel. Went 2600 runs and should be good enough for a little over $2 million.

Deep Water - This is a cautionary tale for anyone who wants to go theatrical and thinks spend can make a film that looks like a streamer do some business. They spent some decent money on this, including a good amount on TV and it’s not coming back at the box-office. They went 1600 runs and it looks like a weekend of $1.5 million or so.

• That’s the Greenband version of that part of the joke, if you don’t know the Redband version, DM me and I’ll share.

** only two evolutions. I finally stopped wearing button down collars recently and I had a short period in the late 80s early 90’s where I caved to fashion and wore pants with pleats in front.

• And I see almost everything in theaters, but between the sell of this feeling like ‘The Real Housewives of Shmatte’s’ and the reveiws bending over backwards to give this a 2 1/2 star fresh but when you read the reviews the story sounds really depressing, it’s a hard pass.