Universal has moved its Robert Downey Jr movie The Voyage of Doctor Dolittle from its original April 12, 2019 release date to January 17, 2020, which is the four-day MLK weekend.
This is also in an effort to capitalize on early winter rolling vacations overseas; not to mention, Q1 has served as a great play period for family fare including Sony’s Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle holdover business, which generated close to 60% of its $404.5 million domestic box office after Christmas, not to mention other titles like Disney’s Moana and Fox’s Night at the Museum 1 and 3, which legged out overseas in the January play period.
Dolittle was originally following in the wake of the first weekend of New Line’s Shazam! and on its new date faces Warner Bros’ Just Mercy and possibly Sony’s Bad Boys 3.
The Voyage of Doctor Dolittle is directed and written by Oscar winner Stephen Gaghan, who took over an earlier draft by Tom Shepherd. The pic also stars Rami Malek, Tom Holland, Emma Thompson, Ralph Fiennes, Marion Cotillard, Selena Gomez, Antonia Banderas, Michael Sheen, John Cena, Octavia Spencer, Carmen Ejogo, Craig Robinson and Kumail Nanjiani among others. Joe Roth, Susan Downey and Jeff Kirschenbaum produce.
Moving up to April 12 next year will be the Will Packer-produced comedy Little, directed by Tina Gordon Chism and starring Black-ish‘s Marsai Martin. The 13 Going on 30-type film follows a woman who relives her life as her younger self was originally dated for September 20. Packer produces alongside production partner James Lopez for Will Packer. Martin serves as EP with Preston Holmes (Night School), Josh Martin, Regina Hall (Girls Trip) and Kenya Barris (Girls Trip, Black-ish). Camilla Blackett (TV’s Fresh Off the Boat) rewrote the current draft, which is based on earlier work from Black-ish’s Tracy Oliver and Gordon.
On its new weekend, Little will share the marquee with such wide entries as Aviron’s After and Fox drama Breakthrough.
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