Jordan Peele, perhaps best known for his Comedy Central sketch comedy series "Key & Peele" with Keegan Michael Key, has set out on his own and is making an impression at the box office with his first film.
The Los Angeles Times reported that "Get Out," Peele's directorial debut, made $30.5 million in three days since it was released in theaters on Friday.
"Get Out" is a thriller about a black man named Chris, played by Daniel Kaluuya, who goes with his girlfriend Rose, played by Allison Williams, to visit her family in the New York suburbs. Things take a sinister turn as Chris meets Rose's family and observes strange behavior among the few black people in the area.
The movie cost $5 million to make a low-budget film by Hollywood standards.
The Associated Press reported that exit polls showed a diverse audience for the movie. Thirty-nine percent of the debut audience was African American, 36 percent were white and 17 percent were Latino with even sales between men and women, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Forty-nine percent were under the age of 25.
The LA Times reported that the movie, which was "praised for its use of the horror genre to tackle race relations, had a healthy demographic split among its debut audience."
The varied appeal to audiences likely contributed to the film dethroning "The Lego Batman Movie" from the top of the box office.
Reviews have been largely positive. It had a 100 percent "fresh" rating for several days on Rotten Tomatoes; only one out of 153 reviews tallied on the movie review aggregator site gave the movie a negative rating.
"Get Out" will start playing in international theaters in March.
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