‘Sing’ Could Set A Box Office Record, But Not One That Anybody Was Expecting

Last weekend, Sing grossed $20.7 million, good for third place in its third frame.

In an extremely competitive weekend, it was separated by just $1.35 million from second place finisher Rogue One and around $2.1 million from the top spot, occupied by Hidden Figures. Nevertheless, the film failed to reach the top spot again, which now puts Sing on track to perhaps become the highest-grossing Hollywood film to never reach No. 1.

With a gross of $214.5M to date, Sing is currently the fourth-highest earner of all time to not achieve first place. The only films ahead of it are Alvin and the Chipmunks ($217.3M), Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel($219.6M), and My Big Fat Greek Wedding ($241.4M). Sing’s gross should be in the range of $275-300M by the time it’s all over, which would make it the winner of this somewhat dubious distinction by a wide margin.

As we pointed out last weekend, Universal probably doesn’t care so much about the No. 1 placement as they do about the fact that Sing has been another hit for their prized animation house, Illumination, and will end up as one of the top-10-grossing domestic films of 2016. Add in the international take of $143.8M so far, and Sing is already over $350M.

Meanwhile, in its seventh weekend, Disney’s Moana picked up $6.4M, lifting its overall domestic total to $225.4M. With an overseas of $224.7M, the global total stands at $450.1M.

Focus Features expanded the vfx/animation-heavy Spanish film A Monster Calls into nearly 1,200 theaters, but the fantasy film wasn’t able to find a big audience, landing in 14th place with just $1.9M. In its home country of Spain, Monster was the top-grossing film of 2016 with $27.9M.