2/22/2009

in

Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail tops weekend box office as Hollywood continues successful year.

Sophie Duensing

EW.com's Hollywood Insider reports that Tyler Perry's latest movie, *Madea Goes to Jail*, topped the weekend box office, bringing in $41.1 million. This number is exceptionally high, as Oscar weekend is historically slow for the moviegoers.  
  
*Madea* brought in the highest gross ever for independent film distributor Lionsgate, better than any previous Tyler Perry film, as well as their successful "Saw" horror films.  
  
The character, "Madea," played by Tyler Perry in drag, is Perry's best-known character, first appearing in *Diary of a Mad Black Woman*.  
  
The weekend's second highest grossing film was 20th Century Fox's thriller, *Taken*, the *Los Angeles Times* reports. *Taken* brought in $11.4 million, down 40 percent from the previous week.  
  
While the economy continues to flounder, Hollywood has had an exceptionally successful year, the *Los Angeles Times* reports. Since January 1, box office sales have reached $1.65 billion. Paul Dergarabedian, head of Media by Numbers, says this is up 23 percent from the same period last year.