"There's a family in our driveway."
Thus begins Us's unraveling from a story about a family on vacation into a tale of such horror that you might be terrified of scissors and red jumpsuits forever. In just its first weekend at the box office, Us earned $70.3 million domestically, scoring the slot for number one launch of an original horror movie, according to The Hollywood Reporter. And as director, writer, and producer of the film, Jordan Peele has proven yet again that he's one of today's most skilled and ambitious filmmakers. As his star continues to rise, we thought we'd break down the numbers.
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In addition to its domestic success, Us made waves abroad as well — totaling $87 million in sales globally, which more than quadrupled the return on the film's $20 million production budget and far exceeded its opening-weekend sales projections of $38 to $45 million. And this comes only two years after Peele's directorial debut, Get Out, which hit $33.4 million domestically in its first weekend and eventually earned $176 million in North America and $255 million worldwide, a staggering figure compared to the film's $4.5 million budget. Get Out was also nominated for four Oscars: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Daniel Kaluuya), and Best Original Screenplay, the latter of which Peele won. Peele's production company, Monkeypaw Productions, operates out of a home office overlooking the Hollywood Hills.
Before his foray into film, Peele was best known for his TV chops. After doing improv in Chicago, he got his small-screen start on Mad TV in 2003, which then led to his own sketch-comedy show, Key and Peele, with his fellow Mad TV cast member Keegan-Michael Key, which ran 53 episodes over five seasons. Peele then went on to star in Fargo and created The Last O.G. on TBS and Weird City on YouTube Premium. Plus, he voices The Ghost of Duke Ellington and various (and hilarious) other voices on Big Mouth. More recently, he has served as a producer on Amazon's Lorena and Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman.
Up next for Peele: a horror series called Lovecraft County on HBO and a reboot of The Twilight Zone. Celebrity Net Worth values Peele at $12 million, which will definitely only increase from here, because luckily for us, Peele's house of horrors isn't going anywhere.