Johnny Depp has returned to the top of the box office.
"Ebenezer," the actor's first major movie since 2018, opened at No. 1 in North America this weekend with $19 million, according to estimates from Rentrak released on Sunday, Nov. 15.
It was a decent but not spectacular showing for the new adaptation of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol," which had a relatively modest budget: The movie cost $38 million to make, according to Variety.
"Ebenezer" is the first film starring Depp to open at No. 1 since 2018's "Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald." Since then, Depp has been embroiled in legal controversies amid allegations of domestic abuse from his ex-wife Amber Heard, which he has consistently denied.
his big Hollywood comeback
In 2020, after Depp lost a libel case against the British newspaper The Sun for calling him a "wife beater," he was dropped from his part as the villain Grindelwald in the "Harry Potter" prequel movies. Mads Mikkelsen took over the role for "Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore."
But in 2022, Depp won a defamation lawsuit against Heard in the U.S. At the end of a high-profile, six-week trial in Virginia, where both actors accused each other of abuse in graphic detail, the jury sided with Depp on three of his claims and with Heard on one of her counterclaims. Heard agreed to pay Depp $1 million as part of a settlement.
"Ebenezer" marked Depp's first big studio movie since the Heard trial, so all eyes were on whether the film would perform well enough to facilitate a larger Hollywood comeback. The film's marketing leaned into it being Depp's return to the screen: The first trailer listed the star's most iconic roles, including Jack Sparrow and the Mad Hatter, before showing his take on Ebenezer Scrooge declaring that it's "good to be back."
"Ebenezer" received mixed reviews from critics, though audiences seem to like it more: Moviegoers polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of A-minus, the same as Depp's versions of "Alice in Wonderland" and "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory."
For Depp, the star's next test will come when "Day Drinker," a thriller that also stars Madelyn Cline and Penélope Cruz, opens in March.
The weekend's other major new release was "How to Rob a Bank." The crime film starring Pete Davidson and Nicholas Hoult bombed with $5.175 million, putting it in seventh place. It charted slightly behind "Ghost Soldier," an action film starring Jim Caviezel that debuted with $5.2 million.
Contributing: Krystie Lee Yandoli
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: How Johnny Depp's comeback movie 'Ebenezer' fared at the box office
