An adaptation of Stephen King’s short story, the Osgood Perkins-directed, James Wan-produced The Monkey was released in theaters over the weekend, the second collaboration between Perkins and NEON after last year’s Longlegs. With a 77% Rotten Tomatoes rating and C+ CinemaScore, how did The Monkey fare at the box office in its first weekend?

In 3,200 theaters across the United States, The Monkey scared up $14.2 million at the box office over the weekend, coming in second place behind Captain America: Brave New World.

While the year is young, The Monkey currently has the horror genre’s highest opening weekend of 2025, besting the $10.8 million opening weekend of Universal’s Wolf Man reboot.

Here are the domestic opening numbers for all this year’s horror movies so far:

• The Monkey – $14.2 million
• Wolf Man – $10.8 million
• Companion – $9.3 million
• Heart Eyes – $8.3 million
• Presence – $3.3 million
• The Damned – $769,721

The Monkey has a reported production budget of $10-11 million, so it should have no problem turning a profit at the box office in the coming weeks. And NEON is smartly staying in the Osgood Perkins business this year, releasing his next movie Keeper in October. You can see the first teaser for Keeper only-in-theaters now, playing immediately after The Monkey.

In The Monkey, “When twin brothers find a mysterious wind-up monkey, a series of outrageous deaths tear their family apart. Twenty-five years later, the monkey begins a new killing spree forcing the estranged brothers to confront the cursed toy.”

The Monkey is a short horror story that appeared in King’s Skeleton Crew, a 1985 collection that also featured The Mist, The Jaunt, The Raft, Survivor Type, The Reach, and more.

Theo James (“The White Lotus”), Tatiana Maslany (She–Hulk: Attorney at Law), Elijah Wood (Maniac), Christian Convery (Sweet Tooth), Colin O’Brien (Wonka), Rohan Campbell (Halloween Ends) and Sarah Levy (Schitt’s Creek) star in this one.