Warner Bros. closed out the year by scoring three of the weekend’s top five, led by ‘Wonka.’ ‘Color Purple’ came in fourth but had a big Christmas opening
After a strong Christmas Day performance by Warner Bros. Pictures’ “The Color Purple,” the studio’s chocolatier-centered musical “Wonka” topped the final weekend box office of 2023 with a modest $23.9 million domestic haul, according to estimates from measurement firm Comscore. Final 2023 numbers, meanwhile, signaled that a turbulent year dominated by Hollywood strikes ultimately belonged to Taylor Swift, Beyoncé and, of course, “Barbenheimer” — while a glut of preexisting IP yielded mixed results.
This weekend, “Wonka” proved too sweet to miss as it bested “Color Purple” and a third Warner Bros. holiday release —”Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom” — to bring its North American cumulative to $134.6 million in its third week. “Aquaman,” the Jason Momoa-led superhero flick, swam to a second-place finish by bringing in $19.5 million in its sophomore outing for a North American total of $77.8 million.
“The Color Purple” — the musical drama adaptation of Alice Walker’s 1982 novel of the same name — came in fourth place at the domestic weekend box office, bringing in $13 million for a North American haul of $45.3 million. The film did, however, earn $18 million on its opening day, the second-best Christmas Day premiere behind only Warner Bros.’ movie “Sherlock Holmes,” which brought in $24.6 million on Dec. 25, 2009.
The 1985 Steven Spielberg-directed version of “The Color Purple,” which starred Whoopi Goldberg, Danny Glover and Oprah Winfrey, opened to $1.7 million in late December 1985. The Oscar-nominated film had a per-screen average of nearly $9,000 in its opening weekend and went on to earn $94 million domestically (roughly $264 million adjusting for inflation) in its original theatrical run.
