Thor: The Dark World stayed at No. 1 in its second weekend in the box office, but Malcolm D. Lee’s comedy The Best Man Holiday came much closer than anyone expected, grossing $30.6 million to place No. 2.
Best Man Holiday sees Morris Chestnut, Taye Diggs, Regina Hall, Terrence Howard, Sanaa Lathan, Nia Long, Monica Calhoun and Melissa De Sousa reprising their roles. The first film, opening to $9 million in 1999, is credited with helping to usher in the era of aspirational African-American comedies.
Black films have been making strong gains at the North American box office, with Fruitvale Station, Lee Daniels’ The Butler and 12 Years a Slave all over-performing. Those movies — all dramas — are drawing a mixed audience, while Best Man Holiday is expected to play primarily to African-Americans, similar to Tyler Perry’s pics. The sequel took some amount of business away from Fox Searchlight’s 12 Years a Slave, which fell 30 percent to $4.6 million.
