Chris Pratt Addresses Backlash Over 'Super Mario Bros. Movie' Casting (Exclusive)

After passing $500M globally through Thursday, Illumination/Nintendo/Universal’s The Super Mario Bros Movie is now on its way to an estimated $659M through Sunday worldwide. Of that, the international box office is estimated to rep $318.6M. 

Brent Lang Executive Editor “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” continues to be a box office high-scorer. The video game adaptation has crossed the $500 million mark at the global box office, shattering records with the gusto that its title character usually amasses power-ups. To date, the animated adventure has earned $260.3 million domestically and $248.4 million internationally. That lifts its worldwide haul to  $508.7 million. It is now the highest-grossing film of 2023 at both the global and domestic box office, surpassing “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” (unlike that movie, people seem to have enjoyed this one). More important, it also makes “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” the biggest video game adaptation in history, topping the grosses of “Warcraft” and “Detective Pikachu.”

The Super Mario Bros. Movie, claiming film critics are “disconnected from reality”.The animated children’s film, adapted from the iconic Nintendo video game franchise, was released in cinemas last week.Reviews have generally been negative, and the film currently holds “Rotten” critics’ score of 57 per cent on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes.However, the audience score – which is voted for by non professional critics – currently sits at 96 per cent positive, making it “Fresh”.On Twitter, Musk commented on the disparity between the critics and audience after an account called @BoredOfElonMusk shared an image of the Rotten Tomatoes scores.“Content review systems are broken.

Chris Pratt had another box office success this weekend with the release of "The Super Mario Bros. Movie." Box office estimates released Sunday showed the Universal Pictures film grossed $146 million domestically across more than 4,300 theaters.

Chris Pratt’s casting as the voice of an animated Italian plumber has been controversial since the news was first announced, but it hasn’t appeared to have dampened enthusiasm at the box office for “The Super Mario Bros. Movie”.

according to IMDB’s Box Office Mojo. The film, which The Post called “lousy,” opened on Wednesday, ahead of the holiday weekend.

With “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” breaking box-office records in its opening weekend, star Chris Pratt — who voices Mario — reveals the vocal characterization he uses in the movie wasn’t his first choice.

Chris Pratt’s casting as the voice of an animated Italian plumber has been controversial since the news was first announced, but it hasn’t appeared to have dampened enthusiasm at the box office for “The Super Mario Bros. Movie”.

Zack Sharf Digital News Director Chris Pratt’s Mario voice has been a topic of discussion ever since the first trailer for “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” debuted last October. Some fans claimed it wasn’t Italian enough, while others felt it was too aggressively Brooklyn. In a new interview with Entertainment Weekly, Pratt revealed that one of his first attempts at the Mario voice got rejected by the film’s directors, Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic, because it far too resembled Tony Soprano, the anti-hero mob boss played by James Gandolfini in HBO’s “The Sopranos.” “For a minute, I walked in and they were like, ‘That’s a little New Jersey. You’re doing a Tony Soprano thing,’” Pratt said. “[The voice] was a really exciting and daunting challenge. Talking to these guys, they say, ‘You wanna do the Mario movie?’ I think both [Charlie Day and I] said yes. Didn’t even ask, ‘What’s the deal? What’s the story?’ ‘Yes, I’m in.’ And then we had to really dig in and figure out…are they Italian? Are they American?”

Brent Lang Executive Editor It’s-a blockbuster! “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” continued to rack up high scores at the box office as it heads into Easter weekend. The animated movie, a collaboration between Illumination, Nintendo and Universal, shows no signs of slowing down, earning a massive $26.5 million on Thursday. That brings its domestic haul to $58.2 million. At this rate, the mustachioed plumber should end his first five days on the big screen with more than $150 million in stateside winnings. Internationally, the movie has earned $62.5 million, pushing global ticket sales to $120.7 million. The week’s other major new release, Amazon Studios’s “Air,” a footwear tale detailing how Nike convinced Michael Jordan to become its most successful brand ambassador, earned $2.4 million on Thursday. That brings the sneaker story’s domestic total to just under $6 million. The film, which stars Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Chris Tucker and Viola Davis, is expected to earn $16 million in its first five days in theaters. That’s a mere blip compared to Mario, but a solid result considering the struggles that movies aimed at adults have faced. Affleck directs the film in addition to starring opposite his “Good Will Hunting” buddy Damon. “Air” cost $90 million to make, meaning that Amazon better sell a lot of paper towels to justify that spending.

voiced by Chris Pratt) and Luigi (Charlie Day) work as plumbers.It’s a realistic setting. I spot mustachioed guys wearing overalls in Williamsburg all the time.But perhaps the boys would be better off selling artisan beard oil on Bedford, because they’re not very good with their socket wrenches.

Zack Sharf Digital News Director With the opening of “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” in theaters, gaming’s most iconic character is coming to the big screen for the first time in 30 years. And if the movie meets box office expectations, Universal Pictures, Illumination and Nintendo will surely hope to launch a brand new animated movie franchise.

The new animated film The Super Mario Bros. Movie is now in theaters and you might be wondering which actors provided voiceover work. We have you covered!

The Super Mario Bros. Movie gives the Mushroom Kingdom the proper big screen treatment.Directed by Aaron Horvarth and Michael Jelenic, the animated film boasts an ensemble voice cast including Chris Pratt as Mario, Anya Taylor-Joy as Peach, Charlie Day as Luigi, Jack Black as Bowser, Keegan-Michael Key as Toad and Seth Rogen as Donkey Kong.The film is a collaboration between Nintendo, Universal Pictures and Illumination, who are best known as the creators of Despicable Me and The Secret Life Of Pets.The film is a breezy trip at 92 minutes.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie boasts an impressive voice cast of Hollywood actors.Directed by Aaron Horvarth and Michael Jelenic, the animated film is a collaboration between Nintendo, Universal Pictures and Illumination (Despicable Me, The Secret Life Of Pets).It’s the second adaptation of the Mushroom Kingdom on the big screen, following the 1993 live-action interpretation starring Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo.Chris Pratt voices Mario, who is originally voiced by Charles Martinet in the games.

Marc Malkin Senior Film Awards, Events & Lifestyle Editor Seth Rogen hopes Hollywood will redeem itself with Universal Pictures’ new animated “The Super Mario Bros. Movie.” Rogen, who voices Donkey Kong in the adaptation of the popular video game series, tells Variety at the film’s premiere, “When I was 11, I saw the original ‘Mario Bros.’ movie and I was so excited. But it’s one of the worst films ever made. I was so disappointed. I think it made me realize that movies, like, could be bad. That never occurred to me until that moment. “It really bummed me out,” he continues. “It’s nice to vindicate that moment. It’s nice to know that 11-year-olds out there that they won’t be disappointed in the same way that I was.”

Owen Gleiberman Chief Film Critic “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” gives you a wholesome prankish druggy chameleonic video-game buzz; it’s also a nice, sweet confection for 6-year-olds. Historically, the proverbial problem with live-action movies based on video games — and “Super Mario Bros.,” a leaden dud released 30 years ago, had the dishonor of being the very first one — is that they jam-pack the screen with tropes and fights and characters and landscapes right out of the game, but when it comes to molding all that gimcrackery into, you know, a story, they lose the electronic pulse that made the game addictive. Digital animation is, and always should have been, the true cousin of video games (which are essentially computer fantasies that you control). And “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” takes full advantage of the sculptural liquid zap of the computer-animation medium. Yet it also has a fairy-tale story that’s good enough to get you onto its wavelength.

It’s a-him! Chris Pratt hasn’t shied away from discussing doubts about his casting as the titular character in The Super Mario Bros. Movie.

Aaron Horvath is addressing fan concerns.

Chris Pratt was in his feels while watching his latest film, .«Man, it was a lot. I did get a little emotional watching this,» Pratt, who voices the beloved Nintendo character, Mario, told ET's Matt Cohen. «I mean, first of all, I didn't know what the movie was going to look like.