After a 36 year wait, the Tom Cruise sequel Top Gun: Maverick finally took off to a massive $19.3M in previews.
That’s the highest grossing preview in Paramount Pictures’ history and the highest grossing Memorial Day preview in history.
Previous big preview for Paramount was 2009’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen with $16M, which were on a Tuesday before a $62M Wednesday (repping 25% of opening day).
Thursday previews began at 3PM for the Paramount/Skydance feature. In addition, there were also a “Top Gun” Tuesday with premium large format, Imax, and Dolby screens opening their curtains at 7PM. The above figure is comprised of Tuesday and Thursday tickets sales.
On a Thursday preview basis, that’s the best Tom Cruise has ever seen, blowing away the $6M previews from 2018’s Mission: Impossible – Fallout. Industry projections earlier this week believe that a $100M+ four-day is in store at 4,735 theaters, which of course would make it the best weekend opening ever for Cruise. His record 3-day (in an elongated Independence Day week launch) belongs to Paramount’s 2005 Steven Spielberg sci-fi movie War of the Worlds at $64.8M.
Top Gun: Maverick means a little something extra to exhibition and studios overall: Outside of older guys attending, which Cruise always attracts (Fallout pulled in 41% men over 25), the hope is that this sequel plays wide, from under 25 to Cruise female fans that hung his posters in their bedrooms during the 1980s. Fallout‘s Thursday night repped 26% of its first day Friday of $22.8M before going on to make $61.2M. There’s plenty working in Top Gun: Maverick‘s favor including a 97% Certified Fresh score after a month’s worth of buzz premieres around the globe and a current audience score on RT of an amazing 99%.
20th Century Studios/Disney’s The Bob’s Burgers Movie saw $1.5M in previews from shows that began at 5PM. The pic is 86% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes with a current audience score of 96%. A $10M-$14M four-day launch is expected at 3,425 U.S./Canada locations.
Among regular ranked movies yesterday, Disney/Marvel’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness earned $2.4M at 4,534 theaters, -14% from Wednesday for a running three week total of $354.4M.
Focus Features’ Downton Abbey: A New Era was second with $1.3M, -11% from Wednesday for a first week’s take $22.6M at 3,820 locations.
Universal/DreamWorks Animation’s The Bad Guys was third yesterday with $576K, +1%, at 3,705 venues and a running five week total of $76.7M.
A24’s Everything Everywhere All at Once booked at 1,576 posted a ninth Thursday of $426K, -16%, and a running cume of $54.3M.
Paramount’s Sonic the Hedgehog 2 drew around $330K, -4%, at 2,943 for a seven week running total of $182.6M.