Crazy Rich Asians continues to rack up crazy great stats.
Jon M. Chu’s groundbreaking film has become the most successful Hollywood studio romantic comedy in nearly a decade at the North American box office after finishing the long Labor Day with an estimated total of $117 million, besting the $110.2 million earned domestically by Amy Schumer’s 2015 pic Trainwreck.
Crazy Rich Asians boasts the top showing for a rom-com — an endangered genre, at least on the big screen— since Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds’ The Proposal earned $164 million in North America in 2009, not adjusted for inflation.
That doesn’t include the specialty pic and Oscar-nominated Silver Linings Playbook (2012), the David O. Russell-directed romantic comedy-drama that grossed $132.1 million in North America. Harvey Weinstein’s indie film company, the now-defunct Weinstein Co., released Silver Linings, starring Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper.
Since its debut in mid-August, Crazy Rich Asians has continued to defy the overall comedy slump gripping the U.S. box office for the past several years.
The $30 million movie, along with the shark pic The Meg and the Tom Cruise tentpole Mission: Impossible — Fallout, also aided in helping fuel a better-than-expected August box office. The month was up nearly 30 percent over a dismal August 2017. (Warners, which released The Meg in addition to Crazy Rich Asians, lays claims to 26 percent of all August domestic revenue.)
And over the Labor Day frame, Crazy Rich Asians eclipsed the 2017 summer box-office hit Girls Trip ($115.2 million) domestically to become the most successful live-action comedy in at least two years, regardless of genre.
Globally, Girls Trip earned $140 million; Crazy Rich Asians, which is still early in its foreign run, has grossed $136.9 million to date at the worldwide box office.
Crazy Rich Asians is the first Hollywood studio film to feature an all-Westernized Asian-American cast since 1993’s The Joy Luck Club. The critically acclaimed movie, appealing to an ethnically diverse audience, has enjoyed a stellar hold and topped the chart for three consecutive weekends.
Crazy Rich Asians follows American Rachel Chu (Constance Wu) as she accompanies her longtime boyfriend Nick Young (Henry Golding) to his best friend’s wedding in Singapore. As Rachel visits Nick’s hometown for the first time, she quickly learns that her boyfriend is not only from one of the richest families in Asia, but also is one of its most eligible bachelors, putting a target on her back from jealous socialites as well as Nick’s formidable mother, Eleanor (Michelle Yeoh). Awkwafina, Ken Jeong, Gemma Chan and Jimmy O. Yang also star.
