Box Office: ‘Cinderella’ Goes Bippity Boppity Boom For $70M Weekend

I may discuss this later this week, but at this point in the big-budget franchise tent pole game, with the Pixar and Disney animation, Star Wars, the Marvel movies, and the live-action fairy tale adaptations, Walt Disney is so far ahead of most of the competition it’s barely a game worth playing for the other studios. Further proof of their relative dominance comes in the form of Kenneth Branagh’s Cinderella, which earned a whopping $70.05 million over its debut weekend. That includes $2.3m worth of Thursday  previews, which made up 3.2% of its weekend total, and a $30.23m Friday, giving the film a solid 3x weekend multiplier. The $95m live-action romantic drama is of course an adaptation of the animated version of the classic fairy tale. The Kenneth Branagh-directed and Chris Weitz-written fantasy stars Lily James, Cate Blanchett, Richard Madden, Helena Bonham Carter, Stellan Skarsgård, Sophie McShera, Holliday Grainger, and Derek Jacobi. The picture debuted to sparkling reviews and strong buzz. I also got a relative boost from the Frozen Fever animated short that preceded it, which in turn was preceded by the official announcement of Frozen 2. It was a perfect storm for a superb debut.