Box Office: ‘Wicked’ Opens to Record-Setting $114 Million, ‘Gladiator II’ Starts Strong With $55.5 Million

variety.com:

Rebecca Rubin Senior Film and Media Reporter If you care to find “Wicked,” look to the top of box office charts. Universal’s adaptation of Act One (with some padding) of the popular Broadway musical was No.

1 in North America with $114 million from 3,888 theaters over the weekend. Those dazzling ticket sales rank as the third biggest domestic debut of the year behind “Deadpool & Wolverine” ($211 million) and “Inside Out 2” ($154 million).

Among other benchmarks, “Wicked” landed the fourth-biggest start in history for a musical, ahead of Disney’s recent “The Little Mermaid” remake ($95.5 million) and behind “Frozen II” ($130 million), as well as the best opening (by far) for a Broadway adaptation, overtaking the record held by 2014’s “Into the Woods” ($31 million). “Wicked” collected an additional $50.2 million at the international box office, bringing its global tally to $164.2 million.

It marks the biggest worldwide opening for a film based on a Broadway show, supplanting Universal’s “Les Miserables” with $103 million in 2012. “It’s a juggernaut,” says David A.