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Beyoncé’s ‘Renaissance� tops the box office with $21 million opening

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Beyoncé’s ‘Renaissance’ tops the box office with $21 million opening

Beyoncé performs onstage during her "Renaissance" tour in Poland.

 Kevin Mazur/WireImage/Getty Images

New York (CNN) � Beyoncé was crowned “queen of the box office� after her concert movie topped the box office in its opening weekend.

“Renaissance: A Film by Beyoncé,� a about the artist’s record-breaking world tour, raked in $21 million since its Friday opening, according to BoxOfficeMojo. It opened in roughly 2,500 theaters through an exclusive distribution deal with AMC Theatres.

“The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes� placed second, grossing $14.5 million and debuted with an $11 million opening.

Notably, “Renaissance� became the first film in two decades to cross the $20 million benchmark for its opening weekend following Thanksgiving, a typically sluggish one. The 2003 release of Tom Cruise’s “The Last Samurai� was the last to accomplish the feat.

“Renaissance� is the second concert film to dominate the box office this year, with Taylor Swift releasing “Eras Tour� also exclusively through AMC, rather than a traditional Hollywood distributor, effectively cutting out the middleman and securing higher paydays .

Both films are sparking some life in the box office, which has been dominated by including “The Marvels� and “Wish.�

Domestic theaters grossed about $553.6 million this November, a 12% decline from last year and still more than $400 million short of pre-pandemic levels, according to data from research firm Comscore. Between 2009 and 2019, Novembers were a reliably lucrative month and could be counted on to rake in nearly a billion dollars, owing in part to the long Thanksgiving weekend.

Other key factors contributing to the disappointing box office included the , which prevented actors from promoting upcoming movies, as well as the anticipated sci-fi blockbuster “Dune: Part Two� that was removed from the November slate and pushed back to a March 2024 release date.

So far this year, domestic theaters have grossed $8.26 billion, about $740 million shy of the $9 billion plus expected for the full year.

–CNN’s Leah Asmelash and Eva Rothenberg contributed to this report.

The-CNN-Wire

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