The Marvel film – starring Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn and Ebon Moss-Bachrach – suffered a 66% drop from its $117.6 million debut, taking in just $40 million this weekend.
The weekend’s new releases – The Bad Guys 2 and The Naked Gun – took the #2 and #3 spots with $22.2 million and $17 million, respectively. Rounding out the top five were Superman and Jurassic World: Rebirth.
The Alison Brie-Dave Franco horror film Together debuted at #6 with $6.8 million.
1. The Fantastic Four: First Steps – $40 million 2. The Bad Guys 2 – $22.2 million 3. The Naked Gun – $17 million 4. Superman – $13.9 million 5. Jurassic World: Rebirth – $8.7 million 6. Together – $6.8 million 7. F1: The Movie – $4.1 million 8. I Know What You Did Last Summer – $2.65 million 9. Smurfs – $1.77 million 10. How to Train Your Dragon – $1.35 million
Disney is the parent company of Marvel and ABC News.
Harvey Weinstein has been convicted on one count of engaging in criminal sex but acquitted on the second in his sex crimes retrial in New York.
The jury was unable to reach a verdict on the rape count.
The verdict comes after some apparent discord in the jury room during deliberations.
On Monday, the jury foreperson wrote in a note to Judge Curtis Farber, “I need to talk to you about a situation that isn’t very good.” The foreperson was called into the judge’s chambers, where he said some jurors were “attacking, talking together, fight together” — adding, “I don’t like it” — according to a transcript of the closed encounter.
The foreperson said jurors were discussing Weinstein’s past.
When the judge summoned the entire jury that day, he reminded them to discuss only the evidence presented at trial and to be cordial.
Prosecutors said Weinstein “preyed on three women” as “he held unfettered power for over 30 years” in Hollywood, while the defense countered the producer did not coerce the women and claimed they were using him for his connections.
Weinstein, 73, pleaded not guilty and has said his sexual encounters were consensual. He did not testify during the trial, where he is being retried for sexually assaulting two women, Mimi Haley and Jessica Mann, after an earlier conviction was overturned on appeal. He is also charged with sexually assaulting a third woman, Kaja Sokola, who was not part of the first trial. All three women have publicly come forward and testified during the trial.
“Harvey Weinstein had enormous control over those working in television and film. He decided who was in and who was out,” the prosecutor, Shannon Lucey, told the jury of seven women and five men at the start of the trial. “He held the golden ticket. The chance to make it or not.”
Lucey claimed that “no” was “not a word the defendant was used to hearing.”
Weinstein’s defense attorney, Arthur Aidala, agreed with prosecutors that Weinstein was a powerful man in the television and film industries, but he told the jury Weinstein did not coerce the women he’s accused of assaulting. Instead, Aidala claimed Weinstein engaged in “mutually beneficial relationships” that the attorney said have been going on in Hollywood for 100 years.
“They’re fooling around with him consensually,” Aidala claimed. “The casting couch was not a crime scene.”
In detailing the alleged sexual assaults, Lucey claimed that when Haley went to Weinstein’s Crosby Street apartment in July 2006 to discuss a production role on Project Runway, he allegedly “held her down” and subjected her to forcible sexual conduct.
Sokola was 16 when she met Weinstein in 2002 at a restaurant in the West Village shortly after signing a modeling contract to come to New York from Poland. Several years later, in 2006, Weinstein cast Sokola as an extra in The Nanny Diaries. After a lunch at a Manhattan hotel that year, Weinstein allegedly “pressed on her shoulders with enough force to get her down on the bed” and forced oral sex on the 19-year-old as she said, “Please do not do this,” Lucey claimed.
Lucey also claimed Weinstein allegedly forced Sokola to touch his genitals in a Manhattan apartment when she was 16. Weinstein is not charged in that alleged 2002 incident in the indictment, as it is outside the statute of limitations. But the judge has allowed Sokola to testify about it during the trial, along with a second alleged incident involving Weinstein she says occurred in 2004. Sokola previously filed a lawsuit in New York under the Child Victims Act over the alleged 2002 incident, which prosecutors said has since been settled.
In 2013, Weinstein allegedly subjected Mann to sex without her consent at a hotel, according to Lucey. Mann testified that Weinstein raped her after finding out she had a serious boyfriend who was an actor. Lucey claimed Mann had also engaged in sexual encounters with Weinstein that were not coerced out of fear of his power in the industry.
The new trial comes after the New York Court of Appeals overturned Weinstein’s initial 2020 conviction last year, finding the trial judge “erroneously admitted testimony of uncharged, alleged prior sexual acts against persons other than the complainants of the underlying crimes.”
Weinstein has also appealed his conviction in December 2022 on sex offenses in Los Angeles. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison there.
If you are affected by abuse and needing support, or know someone who is, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233, or the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673). You can also chat online at thehotline.org or online.rainn.org, respectively.
Sydney Sweeney attends a Sydney, Australia, screening of ‘Anyone But You’ at Hoyts Entertainment Quarter on Dec. 18, 2023. (Brendon Thorne/Getty Images)
President Donald Trump offered praise Monday for Sydney Sweeney amid backlash over a denim ad campaign featuring the actress wearing American Eagle jeans.
“Sydney Sweeney, a registered Republican, has the HOTTEST ad out there,” Trump wrote on his social media platform.
“Go get ’em Sydney,” he added.
Later in his message, which was originally deleted and reposted after incorrectly spelling Sweeney’s first name as “Sidney,” Trump added, “Being WOKE is for losers, being Republican is what you want to be.”
Trump’s post comes as several news outlets reported over the weekend that Sweeney is registered as a Republican in Monroe County, Florida, where she reportedly purchased a mansion in 2024.
Based on publicly available voting records, ABC News was able to pull the voting registration of a Sydney B Sweeney in Summerland Key, Florida, who registered as a Republican in the state and has the same birthday as the actress.
In a gaggle with news reporters on Sunday, Trump was asked by a reporter about his thoughts on reports that Sweeney is a registered Republican.
“Ohhhhh, now I love her ad. Is that right, is Sydney Sweeney?” Trump said. “You’d be surprised at how many people are Republicans. That’s what I wouldn’t have known, but I’m glad you told me that if Sydney Sweeney is a registered Republican, I think her ad is fantastic.”
The Euphoria actress, who has not commented publicly on her voter registration, came under fire recently for her “Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans” ad campaign for American Eagle.
The ads feature a play on the words “jeans” and “genes.”
In one ad, Sweeney says, “Genes are passed down from parents to offspring, often determining traits like hair color, personality and even eye color. My jeans are blue,” as the camera pans up to her face.
In another ad, posted on the company’s social media, Sweeney is seen cleaning a photo of herself with the tagline “Sydney Sweeney Has Great Genes,” with “genes” crossed out to instead read “jeans.”
Some critics of the ad campaign claim it promotes eugenics, a “scientifically inaccurate theory that humans can be improved through selective breeding of populations,” according to the National Human Genome Research Institute.
Other critics say the campaign is hypersexualized and glorifies Sweeney’s physique.
Some commenters online have also compared the ads to actress Brooke Shields‘ controversial 1980 campaign for Calvin Klein. In one of those commercials, the then-15-year-old actress and model pulls on a pair of Calvin Klein jeans while lying on the ground, saying in part, “The secret of life lies hidden in the genetic code. Genes are fundamental in determining the characteristics of an individual and passing on these characteristics to a succeeding generation.”
A representative for Sweeney did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment Monday.
Reached for comment, American Eagle directed ABC News to its statement Friday on social media, in which it said the ad campaign is about “jeans.”
“‘Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans’ is and always was about the jeans. Her jeans. Her story,” the company said in the statement. “We’ll continue to celebrate how everyone wears their AE jeans with confidence, their way. Great jeans look good on everyone.”
ABC News’ Anastasia E. Williams contributed to this report.
Pedro Pascal is doubling down on his criticism of J.K. Rowling.
The actor looked back on how he called out the Harry Potter creator for her anti-trans views in a new Vanity Fair cover story published Tuesday.
Back in April, Pascal responded to a social post criticizing Rowling for celebrating the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom’s ruling that trans women should not be recognized as women and that the term “sex” should legally refer to biological sex.
“I love it when a plan comes together,” Rowling wrote in response to the ruling.
“Awful disgusting S*** is exactly right. Heinous LOSER behavior,” Pascal commented on Rowling’s behavior at the time.
His comment grew into a larger story that attracted headlines and attention. It made him feel like “that kid that got sent to the principal’s office a lot for behavioral issues in public schools in Texas feeling scared and thinking, ‘What’d I do?’” Pascal told Vanity Fair.
The actor questioned whether commenting on the situation helped in any way.
“The one thing that I would say I agonized over a little bit was just, ‘Am I helping? Am I f****** helping?’” Pascal said. “It’s a situation that deserves the utmost elegance so that something can actually happen, and people will actually be protected. Listen, I want to protect the people I love. But it goes beyond that. Bullies make me f****** sick.”
Pascal’s sister Lux Pascal is a trans woman. She came out in 2021.
