newsmakers

newsmakers

Disney’s ‘Frozen’ freezes out ‘Paranormal’ spinoff

NEW YORK

On a wintry weekend, Disney’s “Frozen” retook the box-office top spot with $20.7 million, freezing out the horror spinoff “Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones.”

Paramount’s “The Marked Ones” debuted in second place with $18.2 million, a total that includes Thursday night screenings, according to studio estimates Sunday. The film is a stand-alone story spun off from the lucrative, low-budget horror franchise “Paranormal Activity,” the fifth of which will be released in October.

But it wasn’t able to overcome Disney’s animated “Frozen,” which has been a hit for family audiences for the past seven weeks. It now has surpassed $600 million worldwide, making it the second-highest grossing Disney Animation release, behind “The Lion King.” It soon will pass that film’s $312 million domestic haul, too.

It’s extremely rare for a film to lead the box office in its seventh weekend, a feat accomplished by the likes of “Avatar” and, to go further back, “Legends of the Fall.” It’s rarer still for a film to retake the box-office lead so late in its theatrical run. The last movie to do so was Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ” in 2004, according to box-office tracker Rentrak.

Another hold-over, Warner Bros.’ “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug,” came in third with $16.3 million in its fourth week of release after narrowly topping the busy Christmas weekend box office. Like “Frozen,” Peter Jackson’s second installment of his “Hobbit” trilogy has benefited from the lengthy holiday moviegoing season. Its domestic cumulative total is $229.6 million.

Seagal says he may run for Ariz. governor

PHOENIX

Action-movie star Steven Seagal says he is considering a run for Arizona governor.

The “Marked for Death” actor told KNXV-TV that he is considering a shot at the state’s highest office and has had a talk about the bid with the self-proclaimed toughest sheriff in America.

The 61-year-old made the comments while talking about his newly released reality series, “Steven Seagal — Lawman: Maricopa County.”

Seagal teamed up with Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio for the show, which was shot in Arizona and airs on cable TV’s Reelz Channel.

The martial-arts expert is a member of Arpaio’s posse, made up of 3,000 unpaid civilians. He also has been deputized with sheriff’s offices in New Mexico, Texas and Louisiana and says he wants to increase border security.

Romney accepts apology from host

WASHINGTON

Mitt Romney says he has accepted an apology from an MSNBC host who joked about a Christmas picture that included the 2012 Republican presidential candidate’s adopted, African-American grandson.

Romney told “Fox News Sunday” that he sees Melissa Harris-Perry’s apology as sincere and is ready to move on. He says everyone — himself included — makes mistakes, and the Romney family has forgiven MSNBC.

During a segment, Harris-Perry asked her guests to talk about a photo showing infant Kieran Romney with his grandparents and their 21 other grandchildren, all of them white.

One guest on her Sunday show, actress Pia Glenn, sang “one of these things just isn’t the same.”

Harris-Perry later said her intention was to celebrate diversity, but the segment took an unexpected and offensive turn.

Associated Press