New Line’s Vacation, a rebbot of the franchise that began in 1983, opened respectably with $3.8 million on its first day in the U.S.
The original National Lampoon’s Vacation opened on the same date, July 29, in 1983 and grossed $61 million in the U.S. on a $15 million budget.
The Wednesday figure includes $1.2 million from preview showings on Tuesday night. The raunchy comedy, starring Ed Helms and Christina Applegate, has a two-day head start on Tom Cruise’s “Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation.”
The first-day number signals that “Vacation” may fall short of recent projections of an opening in the $30 million range over five days at 3,310 theaters. “Vacation,” which carries a relatively modest $31 million budget, is not a big risk for New Line.
The movie is launching 32 years after the original. Ed Helms plays the grown-up Rusty Griswold, who decides to take his own family to the fictional California theme park Walley World — with disastrous results.
Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo return as Rusty’s parents.
Vacation has received mostly negative reviews, with a 27% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, meaning that 3 out of 4 reviews have been negative.
It marks the directorial debut of screenwriters Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley.
Raunchy Family Comedies
New Line’s first day of raunchy family comedy, “We’re the Millers” launched with $6.8 million on a Wednesday on August 7, 2013, on its way to a $150 million domestic total.
