“Beauty and the Beast” may be “a tale as old as time,” but audiences are clearly still eager to watch the story unfold: early tracking for the film indicates that Disney’s live-action musical may gross as much as $120 million in its North American debut, The Hollywood Reporter writes.
Studio insiders are offering a more conservative estimate of $100 million-plus for the film’s opening. The Emma Watson-led romance won’t hit theaters until March 17, so we’ll have to wait to find out whose predictions are more accurate. Regardless, it seems safe to say that Disney has a mega hit on their hands.
“Anything above $100 million would mark one of the top showings for the month of March,” THR explains. “The current record holder is last year’s ‘Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice’ with $166.1 million, followed by ‘The Hunger Games’ with $152.5 million in 2012 and fellow Disney live-action film ‘Alice in Wonderland’ with $116.1 million in 2010.” Based on the tracking numbers, it appears that “Beauty and the Beast” will have a similar opening to “Alice in Wonderland,” which went on to earn over a billion dollars worldwide.
The original “Beauty and the Beast” — which made Oscar history as the first animated film to receive a Best Picture nomination — grossed more than $424 million internationally. The 1991 animated film was penned by Linda Woolverton, the same screenwriter behind the live-action “Alice.”
Watson has revealed that this version of the story sees its heroine, Belle, working as an inventor. “In the animated movie, it’s her father who is the inventor, and we actually co-opted that for Belle,” the actress told Entertainment Weekly. “I was like, ‘Well, there was never very much information or detail at the beginning of the story as to why Belle didn’t fit in, other than she liked books. Also what is she doing with her time?’ So, we created a backstory for her, which was that she had invented a kind of washing machine, so that, instead of doing laundry, she could sit and use that time to read instead. So, yeah, we made Belle an inventor,” she explained.
“Beauty and the Beast” marks Watson’s most high-profile project since the last installment of the Harry Potter franchise, 2011’s “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2.” Post-Hogwarts, her credits include “My Week with Marilyn,” “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” “The Bling Ring,” and “Noah.”
Along with Watson, “Beauty and the Beast’s” cast includes Dan Stevens as the Beast, Emma Thompson as Mrs. Potts, Luke Evans as Gaston, Josh Gad as Le Fou, Kevin Kline as Maurice, Ewan McGregor as candelabra Lumiere, Ian McKellen as clock Cogsworth, and Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Plumette. The film is directed by Bill Condon (“Dreamgirls”).
