“Moana 2” and “Depraved” have the largest Thanksgiving field workplace successes of all time

Auliʻi Cravalho voices Moana in Disney Animation's “Moana 2.”

Disney

It was all feast and no famine at Thanksgiving this year.

The tag team of Disney's “Moana 2,” Universal's “Wicked” and Paramount's “Gladiator II” brought the five-day Thanksgiving holiday to the biggest haul in movie history – an estimated $420 million as of Sunday.

“A perfect Thanksgiving box office storm, driven by a trio of films across the musical, epic drama and family film genres, has arrived at the most opportune time to revitalize the theatrical market after a post-summer malaise,” said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst at Comscore.

“Moana 2” led the way with $221 million in the five-day period, a significant overperformance compared to the $100 million that box office analysts had originally expected. It was the highest Thanksgiving weekend performance for a film ever, surpassing 2019's “Frozen II,” which grossed $125 million during the period.

“Wicked” continued its run, recording an estimated $117.5 million in holiday ticket sales, bringing its domestic total to $262.42 million. It is now the most successful Broadway adaptation of all time at the domestic box office. The film has grossed $359.2 million worldwide after ten days in theaters.

“Gladiator II” added $44 million to its Thanksgiving total. The film earned an estimated $111.2 million in domestic ticket sales in its first 10 days in theaters and $320 million worldwide since its international premiere earlier this month.

“There is no shortage of words to describe the historic weekend we enjoyed in theaters,” said Shawn Robbins, director of analytics at Fandango and founder of Box Office Theory. “When a film exceeds expectations, like 'Moana 2' did, that's a big story in itself. When other tentpole films like 'Wicked' and 'Gladiator II' excel at the same time, it's a powerful reminder of how important going to the movies is in our culture.

The Thanksgiving holiday hasn't topped $200 million since 2019, according to data from Comscore. And before this weekend, only one Thanksgiving period had topped $300 million.

The previous record was held by the 2018 list, which was topped by “Ralph Breaks the Internet,” “Creed II” and “Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.” These titles helped generate a combined $315 million in ticket sales.

This year's box office overperformance during the Thanksgiving period also helped narrow the gap between 2024 and 2023 revenues. The 2024 box office was hit hard by double strikes in Hollywood last year, which halted production and pushed back many of the big blockbuster releases to 2025 and beyond.

Heading into this holiday season, 2024 box office revenue was 11% lower than last year. According to data from Comscore, it is currently only 6.4% behind.

Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal and CNBC. NBCUniversal distributed “Wicked” and owns “Fandango.”