"Nenu Sailaja", starring Ram Pothineni and Keerthi Suresh, has continued to keep the cash registers ringing at the US box office and topped the business chart for Telugu movies in its second weekend as well.
"Nenu Sailaja" debuted to good response and collected $476,472 at the US box office in its first week. It became the biggest opener and highest grosser for Ram in the country.
Some predicted that Hindi movie "Wazir" and Telugu film "Killing Veerappan" would slow down its collection by snatching a large number of screens from it. But "Nenu Sailaja", which released in 66 screens in North America, managed to retain 51 theatres in the country in its second week.
However, the film witnessed an over 70% drop in its business when compared to its collection in the opening weekend. The movie has collected $129,608 from 51 screens at the US box office in its second weekend, taking its 10-day total to $606,080 (Rs 4.05 crore).
The Kishore Thirumala-directed romance drama has turned out to be the first big Tollywood money-spinner of 2016 in the US. Leading Indian trade expert Taran Adarsh tweeted: "Telugu film #NenuSailaja - USA - Week 2: Fri $ 40,178, Sat $ 62,009, Sun $ 30,026. Total: $ 608,686 [₹ 4.07 cr]. VERY GOOD! @RentrakIndia (sic)"
"Nenu Sailaja" has beaten "Killing Veerappan", "Bhale Manchi Roju" and "Abbayitho Ammayi" and topped the US business chart for Telugu movies in its second weekend. Its per-screen average ($2,541) is much better than that of big-ticket Bollywood movies "Bajirao Mastani" ($187,594 from 302 screens) and "Dilwale" ($27,721 from 28 screens).
After seeing its pace of collection in the first weekend, some thought "Nenu Sailaja" would become the first Telugu film to surpass the $1-million mark at the US box office in 2016. But the film will not be able to achieve this feat as it will not be able to face the tsunami coming in the form of Sankranti releases like "Nannaku Prematho", "Dictator", "Express Raja" and "Soggade Chinni Nayana".
