A new remake of a John Wayne Western starring Tommy Lee Jones, Zachary Levi, and Neal McDonough is already losing its theatrical footprint after just one week, despite getting a much warmer response from audiences than critics.
Angel and the Badman, the new take on the 1947 John Wayne classic, opened in 2,263 theaters on Oct. 9. By its second weekend, that number fell to 1,270, meaning the Western lost 993 theaters almost immediately. Its second-weekend box office also dropped roughly 80%, from $2.1 million to $433,220.
Zachary Levi Leads a New Take on a John Wayne Classic
Directed by Julio Quintana, the new Angel and the Badman stars Zachary Levi as Quirt Evans, the outlaw at the center of the story, with Tommy Lee Jones and Neal McDonough also among the major cast members. The movie follows Quirt after he is wounded and taken in by a rancher’s daughter, forcing him to reconsider the violent life he has been living.
The original Angel and the Badman, released in 1947, starred John Wayne and Gail Russell and became one of Wayne’s memorable early Westerns.
The new movie also has a familiar face for viewers of modern television Westerns in McDonough, who has appeared in Taylor Sheridan’s Yellowstone and Tulsa King.
But despite the recognizable cast and the John Wayne connection, the remake has struggled to find a broad theatrical audience.
Critics Don’t Think Much of the Remake
The critical response hasn’t exactly helped.
Angel and the Badman currently sits at just 23% on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 13 critics’ reviews. The site’s critical consensus is still developing with such a small number of reviews, but the individual reactions have generally been mixed to negative.
The audience response is a very different story.
The movie currently has a 78% verified audience score on Rotten Tomatoes from more than 50 ratings. That’s not enough to suggest the movie has become a runaway crowd-pleaser, but it does show a considerable gap between what professional critics think of the remake and what ticket-buying audiences think.
The Box Office Numbers Tell the Bigger Story
The movie earned about $2.1 million during its opening weekend from 2,263 theaters, putting its per-theater average at roughly $935. It then dropped to about $433,000 during its second weekend while playing in 1,270 theaters.
That works out to a second-weekend per-theater average of only about $341.
For comparison, Angel and the Badman has now brought in roughly $3.7 million domestically since its Oct. 9 release. The Numbers currently lists an average theatrical run of just 1.6 weeks per theater.
In other words, the John Wayne remake isn’t simply experiencing a normal second-weekend dip. Its theater count has been slashed at the same time that its box office has fallen sharply.
That doesn’t necessarily mean the movie disappears completely. A movie can continue playing in select theaters after losing a large portion of its initial locations. But for a wide release that opened in more than 2,200 theaters, dropping below 1,300 locations after its first weekend is a significant change.
And for anyone hoping to see Tommy Lee Jones in a classic-style Western on the big screen, the window may be closing quickly.
