Disney’s “The Lion King” roared past another box office milestone, crossing the billion-dollar mark after less than three weeks in theaters.
The movie joins “Avengers: Endgame,” “Captain Marvel” and “Aladdin” as the fourth Disney title to surpass $1 billion in global ticket sales this year. It’s yet more evidence of the company’s utter dominance of the film space. Thanks to its blockbuster-heavy slate, Disney has nearly 38% of the domestic market share, a cut that increases to more than 40% when Fox, the studio its parent company purchased earlier this year, is taken into account.
Director Jon Favreau’s hyperrealistic remake of “The Lion King” is already the fifth-biggest global release of the year. The film has earned $361 million at the domestic box office and $638 million overseas. Outside of North America, it had especially strong showings in China with $115 million, along with the United Kingdom with $48 million and Brazil with $44 million.
The movie’s starry voice cast includes Donald Glover as Simba, Beyonce as Nala, Chiwetel Ejiofor as Scar, and Billy Eichner and Seth Rogen as Timon and Pumbaa. James Earl Jones reprised his role as Mufasa from the original animated film.
The milestone comes on the heels of another Disney benchmark. Last weekend, the company set a new all-time record for global ticket sales for a single studio. Disney hit $7.67 billion worldwide, smashing the mark it previously set in 2016 with $7.61 billion.
Disney set a new record in 2016 with four films that grossed over $1 billion. In the coming months, Disney will release “Frozen 2,” a “Maleficent” sequel and “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.” That means there’s an awfully good chance that Disney could field at least one more $1 billion grosser by the time January 2020 rolls around.
