Les Misérables box office: Musical overperforms on Christmas Day
Dec. 26 update (followed by January 2013 update with box office actuals): In late December 2012 box office news, the film version of the international stage hit Les Misérables opened strongly on Christmas Day in the domestic market – $18.1 million at 2,808 locations – far surpassing distributor Universal’s (official) expectations of around $10 million.
True, studios tend to underestimate the opening-weekend (or opening-day) grosses of their films – for obvious reasons – but this is a bit much. It just remains to be seen whether such an impressive performance for a nearly three-hour musical will hold in the coming days, as pre-sales accounted for a major percentage of the tickets sold on Dec. 25.
Les Misérables cast
Directed by Academy Award winner Tom Hooper (The King’s Speech, 2010), Les Misérables features Hugh Jackman, Oscar winner Russell Crowe (Gladiator, 2000), and Oscar nominees Anne Hathaway (Rachel Getting Married, 2008) and Helena Bonham Carter (The Wings of the Dove, 1997; The King’s Speech, 2010), in addition to Eddie Redmayne, Amanda Seyfried, Sacha Baron Cohen, Aaron Tveit, and Samantha Barks.
Based on Alain Boublil, Claude-Michel Schönberg, and Jean-Marc Natel’s 1980 stage musical adaptation of Victor Hugo’s classic 1862 novel, the Les Misérables screenplay is credited to Boublil, Schönberg, Herbert Kretzmer (who provided the English-language libretto/lyrics for the stage musical), and two-time Oscar nominee William Nicholson (Shadowlands, 1993; Gladiator, 2000).
Les Misérables with Anne Hathaway. If ever there was a shoo-in Oscar contender, that would be Anne Hathaway for her performance as the ill-fated Fantine, who goes from factory worker to street prostitute to dead in Tom Hooper’s musical based on Victor Hugo’s socially conscious 1862 novel. Until her Catwoman in Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises, Hathaway was best known for David Frankel’s The Devil Wears Prada (2006), cast as Meryl Streep’s fashion-unconscious assistant, and for two teen-girl-oriented Garry Marshall flicks of the early 21st century: The Princess Diaries (2001) and The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement (2004).
Les Misérables reviews: Mixed bag
The 2012 Les Misérables reviews are beginning to pour in. The trailers look great, but some reviewers found the film itself quite a bit less so. Below are a couple of samples:
“A gallery of stellar performers wages a Sisyphean battle against musical diarrhea and a laboriously repetitive visual approach in the big screen version of the stage sensation Les Misérables. … Director Tom Hooper has turned the theatrical extravaganza into something that is far less about the rigors of existence in early 19th century France than it is about actors emoting mightily and singing their guts out. As the enduring success of this property has shown, there are large, emotionally susceptible segments of the population ready to swallow this sort of thing, but that doesn’t mean it’s good.” Todd McCarthy, The Hollywood Reporter.
Regarding Anne Hathaway’s performance as Fantine – remember, the singing in Les Misérables was recorded live – The Guardian’s Catherine Shoard writes:
“She turns [‘I Dreamed a Dream’] into a symphony of phlegmy upset, climaxing in a panic attack of bloke woe (‘He took my childhood in his stride / But he was gone when autumn came’). It’s a performance of monumental welly, one you’d be too plain frightened to refuse an award.”
Shoard sums up her Les Misérables review with the following:
“But the experience of actually sitting through Les Mis, all 160 minutes of it, can feel less like an awards bash than an epic wake, at which the band is always playing and the women are forever wailing. By the end, you feel like a piñata on the dance floor: empty, in bits, the victim of prolonged assault by killer pipes.”
That was something to look forward to on Christmas Day in a handful of countries, including the United States and Canada. Audiences in most other major markets will have to wait for Les Misérables’ killer-pipe assault until early 2013.
Of note, Les Misérables was totally bypassed by the New York Film Critics Circle Awards, though Anne Hathaway was a top contender for Best Supporting Actress. (The eventual winner was Sally Field for Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln.) Hathaway was also the Los Angeles Film Critics Association’s runner-up to Amy Adams (The Master).
The National Board of Review, for their part, listed Tom Hooper’s musical as one of the year’s Top Ten Films and selected the Les Misérables ensemble as the best of the year.
Les Misérables trailer is out. (Please scroll down.) You can hear Anne Hathaway’s miserable Fantine singing “I dreamed that love would never die … I had a dream my life would be so different from this hell I’m living.” All the while, dialogue-less bits from the film are shown featuring Hugh Jackman as Jean Valjean, Russell Crowe as Inspector Javert, Amanda Seyfried as Crosette, and Eddie Redmayne as Marius.
I believe that even those who aren’t fans of modern Hollywood musicals (or Broadway musicals) will agree that the Les Misérables trailer looks impressive. As for Anne Hathaway’s rendition of “I Dreamed a Dream,” it sounds equally impressive. Best Actress Oscar nod? Another question: Apart from the pathological Javert, why aren’t the villains shown in the trailer? Or did I miss them?
The big-screen version of Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil’s Tony Award-winning stage musical, itself based on Victor Hugo’s novel, opens Dec. 14. Tom Hooper, Oscar winner for The King’s Speech, directed.
The Les Misérables screenplay is credited to William Nicholson, whose previous efforts include Michael Apted’s Nell, Richard Attenborough’s Shadowlands, and Ridley Scott’s Best Picture Oscar winner Gladiator.
In addition to Tony Award winner Hugh Jackman (The Boy from Oz), Oscar winner Russell Crowe (Gladiator), The Dark Knight Rises star and Oscar nominee (for Rachel Getting Married) Anne Hathaway, Mamma Mia!’s Amanda Seyfried, and My Week with Marilyn’s Eddie Redmayne, the Les Misérables cast includes two-time Oscar nominee Helena Bonham Carter (The Wings of the Dove, The King’s Speech) as the villainous Madame Thénardier; The Dictator’s Sacha Baron Cohen as Monsieur Thénardier; and Colm Wilkinson, Jean Valjean in the original West End production, as the Bishop of Digne.
Also in the musical’s cast: Samantha Barks, Aaron Tveit, Ella Hunt, George Blagden, Bertie Carvel, Daniel Huttlestone, and Isabelle Allen.
Hugh Jackman’s Jean Valjean and Russell Crowe’s Inspector Javert are seen above in the upcoming Les Misérables movie, the big-screen version of Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil’s highly successful, Tony Award-winning stage musical, itself based on Victor Hugo’s novel. Tom Hooper, Oscar winner for The King’s Speech, directed. [Definitely not a musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber, as previously stated in this article. See comments below.]
Les Misérables, of course, will arrive covered with a patina of “prestige.” In addition to Tony Award winner Jackman (The Boy from Oz), and Oscar winners Crowe (Gladiator) and Hooper, the film’s cast boasts the following: The Dark Knight Rises star and Oscar nominee Anne Hathaway (Rachel Getting Married) as Fantine; two-time Oscar nominee Helena Bonham Carter (The Wings of the Dove, The King’s Speech) as the villainous Madame Thénardier; Mamma Mia!’s Amanda Seyfried as Cosette; My Week with Marilyn’s Eddie Redmayne as Marius, The Dictator’s Sacha Baron Cohen as Thénardier; and Colm Wilkinson, Jean Valjean in the original West End production, as the Bishop of Digne.
The Les Misérables screenplay is credited to William Nicholson, whose previous work includes Michael Apted’s Nell, Richard Attenborough’s Shadowlands, and Ridley Scott’s Best Picture Oscar winner Gladiator. Among Les Misérables’ producers are Eric Fellner and Tim Bevan (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Senna). Cinematography by the Oscar-nominated Danny Cohen (The King’s Speech). Production design by two-time Oscar nominee Eve Stewart (The King’s Speech, Topsy-Turvy). Costume design by Paco Delgado (Bad Education, The Skin I Live In).
Les Misérables opens Dec. 14. Also in the musical’s cast: Samantha Barks, Aaron Tveit, Ella Hunt, George Blagden, Bertie Carvel, Daniel Huttlestone, and Isabelle Allen.
“Les Misérables Box Office: Christmas’ Musical Hit” notes
Eddie Redmayne, Amanda Seyfried, Anne Hathaway, Russell Crowe, and Hugh Jackman Les Misérables images: Working Title | Universal Pictures.
*last modified in June 2026.