Theater Averages: Café Tops Yearly Chart with an Average of $71,858

July 19, 2016

Café Society

Café Society earned first place on the theater average chart with an average of $71,858 in five theaters over the weekend. This is not only the best of the weekend, it is the best of the year so far, topping the previous champ, Captain America: Civil War, which had an average of $42,390 during its opening weekend. Second place went to Hillary’s America: The Secret History of the Democratic Party with an average of $24,938; however, while this is a great result for a documentary, digging just a little into the film’s numbers reveals major weaknesses. The film fell 50% from Friday to Saturday. That’s devastating. We will see if this is an anomaly or a portent when we get this coming weekend’s results. Ghostbusters and The Secret Life of Pets were neck-and-neck with averages of $11,612 and $11,604 respectively.

None of the rest of the new limited releases did particularly well, but they all had mitigating circumstances of one type or the other. Equals was playing on VOD, so its average of $4,603 in two theaters is acceptable. Likewise, Phantom Boy is an animated film, so earning $4,352 is expected. Finally there’s Lucha Mexico, which only managed an average of $290 in 25 theaters, but it too was playing on VOD.

This past week also saw milestones reached for a few Per Theater Chart alumni:

  • Hunt for the Wilderpeople had its best weekend so far and that helped it top $1 million over the weekend. Its per theater average suggests it doesn’t have a lot of room to expand, but it should get to $2 million this coming weekend.
  • Maggie's Plan reached $3 million early in the weekend, while $4 million isn’t out of the question.
  • Sultan hit $5 million over the weekend, which is better than expected. On the other hand, it fell nearly 60%, so getting to $10 million is very unlikely.
Weekend Box Office Results

Filed under: Theater Averages, Ghostbusters, The Secret Life of Pets, Lucha Mexico, Captain America: Civil War, Phantom Boy, Equals, Maggie’s Plan, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, Café Society, Hillary’s America: The Secret History of the Democratic Party, Sultan