The $33m (£20.5m) debut of Think Like a Man defeated The Hunger Games for the first time in five weekends and allowed Sony's Screen Gems division to enjoy a little love as everybody gets ready for the arrival of The Avengers in a fortnight. Tim Story directed the romcom featuring a skilful ensemble of Michael Ealy, Kevin Hart, Gabrielle Union and Taraji P Henson, among others.
As for The Hunger Games, nobody will be shedding a tear. It has amassed more than $355m in North America and $533m worldwide in one month. After Gary Ross said he wouldn't return to direct the second episode, Lionsgate had to hustle and announced Francis Lawrence, the music video specialist whose theatrical CV includes I Am Legend, Constantine and more recently Water for Elephants. Catching Fire is already dated for a late 2013 release. Once you've got a franchise you can't keep the fans waiting.
Warner Bros opened its Nicholas Sparks adaptation The Lucky One in second place. Surely nobody believes Zac Efron as a former marine? He's old enough to qualify for active duty but it's a stretch to turn him into a battle-hardened soldier. Not for Efron the thousand-yard stare of combat veterans; his gaze reaches only as far as the mirror. Nonetheless the reviewers appreciated him in romantic mode opposite love interest Taylor Schilling and that's probably what mobilised audiences, too.
Disneynature has built up a solid business in nature documentaries in recent years and, on the back of this, Chimpanzee opened well in fourth place on $10.2m. Last week ended tumultuously for Disney following the shock firing of Walt Disney Studios chairman Rich Ross and studio top brass would probably give their right arms to spend a little downtime with wild apes. In hindsight, Ross's departure is no surprise given the calamitous underperformance of John Carter and that humiliating $200m writedown, but before the news broke on Friday there was no media commentator that I am aware of calling for his sacking.
Ross got the job in October 2009 after a supersonic trajectory as head of the Disney Channel when he spawned the High School Musical franchise. But he was unable to achieve the same success on the big screen. He was slow to build his own movie slate as chairman and only one – the flop Prom – came out in his two-and-a-half years at the helm of Walt Disney Studios. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides was a global hit, but it would take a monstrous feat of ineptitude to screw up that one. The animation Mars Needs Moms also stumbled at the box office; the feeling is that Ross made some poor hires (case in point: the short-lived marketing chief MT Carney) and Disney did a poor job of selling its slate to the world.
The Avengers seems destined to become a major success when it goes on release in much of the world this week and in the US on 4 May, so Disney Company chairman and CEO Bob Iger needs to swing the axe quickly to clear out the old. Such is the way of cut-throat Hollywood. Now the question of his successor bubbles to the surface and Iger needs to get it right.
North American top 10, 20-22 April 2012
1 Think Like a Man, $33m
2 The Lucky One, $22.8m
3 The Hunger Games, $14.5m. Total: $356.9m
4 Chimpanzee, $10.2m
5 The Three Stooges, $9.2m. Total: $29.4m
6 The Cabin in the Woods, $7.8m. Total: $26.9m
7 American Reunion, $5.2m. Total: $48.3m
8 Titanic 3D, $5m. Total: $52.8m
9 21 Jump Street, $4.6m. Total: $127.1m
10 Mirror Mirror, $4.1m. Total: $55.2m
