Fetch happens: Mean Girls tops weekend box office, beating original's opening numbers

Mean Girls isn't a regular remake — it's a cool remake.

The new movie musical, adapted from the 2018 Tony-nominated Broadway show, opened with $28 million over the three-day weekend, Comscore reports.

Adding in estimates for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Mean Girls is set to gross $32 million domestically. Internationally, the film took in another $6.5 million, for a worldwide gross (minus MLK Day) of $34.5 million, on a budget of $36 million. So fetch.

Though the 2004 film feels like it was a ubiquitous smash when it first came out, the OG Plastics earned only $24.4 million in that movie's opening weekend — but it, too, clinched the top spot at the box office. Of course, that's in 2004 dollars — adjusted for inflation, it's closer to $40 million.

The original went on to gross $86.1 million ($130.1 million worldwide), and its popularity has only grown in the 20 years since it launched a young Lindsay Lohan to superstardom, so we'll have to wait to see if this edition has the same legs.

Coming in second, the Jason Statham action thriller The Beekeeper earned an estimated $19.1 million over the four-day weekend ($34.1 million globally) . The title refers to a secret organization that keeps society in order — it's doing a terrible job — but the movie also required Statham to learn the apiary trade, something director  David Ayer says he "embraced."

"In the opening, Jason’s pulling out the comb, and smoking the hive, and doing all the processes," Ayer told EW. "That’s real. The bees are real. He learned how to do all of that. It’s interesting, because we see him as this rough punch-up guy, and yet he got the zen of it — he really embraced the zen of beekeeping."

Meanwhile, Wonka continues to be a sweet spot for audiences, grossing an estimated $10.9 million over the holiday weekend, bringing its domestic total through Monday to $178.7 million ($505.3 million worldwide through Sunday).

The R-rated rom-com Anyone but You, starring Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell, held strong in fourth place in its fourth week of release with a projected $9.3 million, increasing its haul to $57.5 million domestically ($78 million worldwide).

The animated family film Migration, written by White Lotus' Mike White, rounds out the top 5 at the box office with $8.3 million through Monday, for a four-week domestic cume of $87.9 million ($172.6 million globally).

Also opening this weekend, Jeymes Samuel's The Book of Clarence, starring LaKeith Stanfield as the titular Clarence, a streetwise hustler trying to co-opt Jesus Christ's shine to his own ends. The movie earned a projected $3 million for ninth place at the box office.

"How many people were trying to act like they were Jesus around that time? It was probably crazy," Stanfield told EW. "So we're taking one of those dudes in an imaginary sense and bringing his story to life for very real lessons that I think appeal to — definitely appeal to me — but hopefully it can appeal to everyone."

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• Related content:
• Making fetch happen: What to expect from the Mean Girls musical movie
• Yes, Jason Statham learned how to be a beekeeper for The Beekeeper
• LaKeith Stanfield on The Book of Clarence and how Jesus envy likely inspired imposters