Why Michael Might Not Be a Box Office Success for Lionsgate
The Michael biopic is showing some early warning signs that it may not be the box office smash that Lionsgate Films is looking for. Directed by Antoine Faqua, the upcoming theatrical autobiography of Michael Jackson’s ascension to a global pop sensation in the 1980s has been difficult to predict in terms of its box office sales. One teaser trailer for the film went viral in November 2025, amassing over 30 million views within several hours of its release, and some believed that it would surpass Bohemian Rhapsody’s worldwide haul of $900 million. But some recent figures show that its momentum has stagnated to a degree, yet Lionsgate has revealed that it has very high expectations for the movie, which comes out very soon in the US on April 24, 2026.
Michael’s latest box office projections have surprisingly decreased
A new projection from BoxOffice Pro has Michael only earning $60 million to $75 million in its domestic opener, which is a significant decline from its initial $80 million to $90 million forecast for the movie in late March.
Offering a similar assessment, the analytics site BoxOfficeTheory, which believed in mid-March that the film would get somewhere between $52 million and $65 million in its domestic opener, has not changed its projections. It reports that while presales for the biopic have been high, it hasn’t passed those for other musical-heavy films like Wicked and its fellow competition like The Devil Wears Prada 2, which unfortunately for Michael is set to release just a week after its release on May 1. That could sap a lot of the momentum from the film in its early stages. (It’s also a bit unlucky, given that the film was delayed several times in part to have a better release window.)
Meanwhile, Lionsgate has revealed that it has lofty box office goals for the biopic, despite it being an original movie and starring Jaafar Jackson, Michael Jackson’s nephew, in the titular role in his theatrical debut as an actor. Typically, for a movie to be labelled a box office success, it needs to earn about 2.5 times its production budget. Combining the $155 million the film was greenlit for and the extra $10 million to $15 million it cost to reshoot the third act of the film due to legal issues, that means Michael will need to make somewhere around $400 million to break even.
However, a report from Variety notes that the studio hopes that the biopic will gross north of $700 million worldwide. That’s also how much the film will need to make for Lionsgate to consider a sequel (which would need to cover the difficult accusations Michael Jackson faced late in his life), though that’s an extremely high bar for any film to clear. As a point of comparison to blockbusters made in 2025, Superman grossed $618 million, F1: The Movie made $634 million, and The Fantastic Four: First Steps earned $521 million. Two of those are well-established franchises, while F1 was made to be an IMAX spectacle and is a global brand.
With Michael’s $700 million benchmark, what Lionsgate is hoping for is that it soars like 2018’s Bohemian Rhapsody, which was released before the COVID-19 pandemic. That Freddie Mercury biopic only had a $51 million domestic opener and a $216 million overall haul in the US and Canada, but its international success nearly reached a whopping $700 million, putting its worldwide total at $910 million. Since Michael Jackson is a musical icon that’s a notch higher in popularity and recognition than Freddie Mercury, the idea goes that Michael will naturally earn more than Bohemian Rhapsody did.
Now, there is still a possibility that the early hype train for the movie will translate into late-stage momentum within the next two weeks and strong walk-up sales from casual audiences. Either way, it looks like Michael might need to accept lower ticket sales than expected domestically and instead rely on its international appeal to satisfy Lionsgate.
Source: Comingsoon.net