The opening weekend of Jonah Hill’s feature directorial debut Mid90s has given distributor A24 two of the year’s three best opening-frame per-theater averages to date. Fresh off premiere screenings at the Toronto and New York film festivals, the coming-of-age pic grossed $249,500 during the weekend for a robust $62,375 per-screen average to lead a full slate of specialty fare.

“Can You Ever Forgive Me?” Fox Searchlight

Also debuting this weekend was Fox Searchlight’s Can You Ever Forgive Me?, starring Melissa McCarthy and Richard E. Grant, which started its box office run by taking in $150,000 in five locations. Wildlife, from director and co-writer Paul Dano and starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Carey Mulligan, opened $105,614 in four locations, averaging $26,403.

A24 said Mid90s, starring Sunny Suljic, Lucas Hedges and Katherine Waterston in Hill’s homage to his growing up in 1990s Los Angeles, will add more runs next weekend after the strong opening. It was 2018’s third-best per-screen start behind National Geographic Documentary Film’s Free Solo ($73,572 opening average) and A24’s own summer hit Eighth Grade ($65,949 PTA).

“Exit polls were also through the roof in [New York and Los Angeles] from the predominantly under 35-year old audience that responded to Jonah’s touching and entertaining ode to an era with incredible performances from the ensemble cast,” said A24, which touted “energized sellouts” and the film’s “terrific start.”

The start didn’t crowd out other high-profile newcomers. Can You Ever Forgive Me?, from second-time feature director Marielle Heller, did well out of the gate with its $30K per-screen average. McCarthy plays bestselling celebrity biographer Lee Israel in the pic, which had been 10 years in the making.

“[Can You Ever Forgive Me?] is able to play in both commercial, mainstream theaters and specialty venues,” Fox Searchlight said Sunday, adding that it expects the pic to be in 20-25 theaters next week when it adds new markets Toronto, Chicago, San Francisco, Phoenix and Washington, D.C. Further expansion is planned from there.

Not far behind was Wildlife , also by a first-time director in Dano, who wrote the script with Zoe Kazan. IFC Films acquired the pic after its Sundance bow.

“Paul Dano has made an impressive first feature and we are thrilled to see the critical support,” IFC co-president Jonathan Sehring said. “The creative collaboration on and off screen between Paul, Jake, Carey and co-writer Zoe Kazan is what independent filmmaking is all about. Carey Mulligan delivers an awards-worthy performance and we are excited for audiences to see the film as we expand nationally in the coming weeks.”

Also premiering this frame was The Met Opera: Live in HD: Saint-Saëns’s Samson et Dalila in 900 North American theaters as an event performance. It grossed $1.25 million, which reps 60,000 admissions. The Met Opera’s next installment will be Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West next week. Bleecker Street opened What They Had by first-time director Elizabeth Chomko and starring Hilary Swank and Michael Shannon, grossing $18,845 ($4,711 average).

Abramorama’s release of HBO documentary The Price of Everything kicked off with an exclusive engagement at New York’s Quad, grossing $17,280 in what the distributor said was a 100-seat theater.

Among second-week expansions, Amazon Studios grew its Beautiful Boy theater count to 48, grossing $439K ($9,147 average), which gives it a cume of $722,006. Sony Pictures Classics added 17 theaters for its Oscar Wilde biopic The Happy Prince which in $58,862 in 25 theaters ($2,354 average), good for a $117,395 cume.

Roadside Attractions/Topic Studios’ The Oath, from Ike Barinholtz, jumped to 300 theaters in its second frame from its initial 10. The Thanksgiving political comedy starring Barinholtz and Tiffany Haddish played to a sluggish $223,510 gross, averaging $745, after taking $29,077 in its opening week.

Free Solo, meanwhile, continues to ascend, marking its first month in theaters with an expansion and a weekend gross of just more than $1M. The Nat Geo title by Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi averaged $4,020 Friday-Sunday, bringing its four-week cume to $3,592,812. Compared with the three other big docus of the year — Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, RBG and Three Identical Strangers — the title is showing similar zest at this stage of its release. RBG grossed $1.28M in its fourth weekend in 415 theaters ($3,105 average); Won’t You Be My Neighbor? was in 654 locations in Weekend 4, grossing $2.42M ($3,703 average); and Three Identical Strangers took in $1.47M from 332 runs ($4,440 average).

Crossing box office gross milestone this weekend: Fox Searchlight’s Robert Redford-starrer The Old Man & The Gun. The David Lowery-directed feature grossed $2.05M in 802 theaters, averaging $2,556 and bringing its cume to just over $4.2M. Neon’s Assassination Nation edged just over $2M at the start of the weekend, grossing $2,241 ($448 average) for the weekend as it winds down its theatrical run.

Bleecker Street’s period drama Colette, starring Keira Knightley, wrapped its fifth frame just shy of $3.7M after grossing an estimated $585,020 over its three day in 520 theaters, averaging $1,125 per screen.

NEW RELEASES

The Advocates (Cinema Libre) NEW [1 Theater] Weekend $4,000

Can You Ever Forgive Me? (Fox Searchlight) NEW [5 Theaters] Weekend $150,000, Average $30,000

An Evening With Beverly Luff Linn (The Film Arcade) NEW [16 Theaters] Weekend $4,800, Average $300

Horn From The Heart: The Paul Butterfield Story (Abramorama) NEW [1 Theater] Weekend $4,166

Mid90s (A24) NEW [4 Theaters] Weekend $249,500, Average $62,375

The Met: Live in HD, Saint-Saëns’s Samson et Dalila (Met Opera) Event Engagement [900 Theaters] Weekend $1,250,000

On Her Shoulders (Oscilloscope) NEW [1 Theater] Weekend $4,500

The Price of Everything (HBO) NEW [1 Theater] Weekend $17,280

What They Had (Bleecker Street) NEW [4 Theaters] Weekend $18,845, Average $4,711

Wildlife (IFC Films) NEW [4 Theaters] Weekend $105,614, Average $26,403

Wings Of Desire (Janus Films) NEW (1987 re-release) [1 Theater] Weekend $11,635

RETURNING/SECOND WEEKEND

Beautiful Boy (Amazon Studios) Week 2 [48 Theaters] Weekend $439,056, Average $9,147, Cume $722,006

Bigger (Freestyle Releasing) Week 2 [5 Theaters] Weekend $516, Average $103

The Happy Prince (Sony Pictures Classics) Week 2 [25 Theaters] Weekend $58,862, Average $2,354, Cume $117,395

Liyana (Abramorama) Week 2 [1 Theater] Weekend $1,307, Cume $7,977

The Oath (Roadside Attractions/Topic Studios) Week 2 [300 Theaters] Weekend $223,510, Average $745, Cume $261,406

HOLDOVERS / THIRD+ WEEKENDS

The Great Buster: A Celebration (Cohen Media Group) Week 3 [3 Theaters] Weekend $7,436, Cume $24,672

The Hate U Give (20th Century Fox) Week 3 [2,303 Theaters] Weekend $7,500,000, Average $3,257, Cume $10,641,873

Free Solo (National Geographic Documentary Film/Greenwich Entertainment) Week 4 [251 Theaters] Weekend $1,009,168, Average $4,020, Cume $3,592,812

Matangi / Maya / M.I.A. (Abramorama) Week 4 [6 Theaters] Weekend $9,763, Average $1,627, Cume $170,028

Monsters And Men (Neon) Week 4 [25 Theaters] Weekend $13,433, Average $537, Cume $481,437

The Old Man & The Gun (Fox Searchlight) Week 4 [802 Theaters] Weekend $2,050,000, Average $2,556, Cume $4,200,856

Assassination Nation (Neon) Week 5 [5 Theaters] Weekend $2,241, Average $448, Cume $2,003,830

Colette (Bleecker Street) Week 5 [520 Theaters] Weekend $585,020, Average $1,125, Cume $3,693,223

The Sisters Brothers (Annapurna) Week 5 [1,141 Theaters] Weekend $742,014, Average $650, Cume $1,971,000

God Bless The Broken Road (Freestyle Releasing) Week 7 [6 Theaters] Weekend $2,039, Average $340, Cume $2,837,822

The Wife (Sony Pictures Classics) Week 10 [130 Theaters] Weekend $138,429, Average $1,064, Cume $7,482,171

Tea With The Dames (Sundance Selects) Week 5 [70 Theater] Weekend $80,862, Average $1,155, Cume $433,688

Pick Of The Litter (Sundance Selects) Week 8 [20 Theaters] Weekend $10,137, Average $507, Cume $517,351