Old School. Biblically Independent.
By Kayleigh Donaldson | Celebrity | October 7, 2026
The number one film at the box office this week is Verity. Adapted from the book by Colleen Hoover, one that I would generously describe as “What if Rebecca was written by someone with active contempt for the entire concept of the novel”, the movie earned an impressive $32 million in its opening weekend. That was four times the gross of Tom Cruise’s Digger, which may have cost four times as much to make as Verity. That wasn’t great news for Cruise, but maybe he can take some solace in the success of his future Days of Thunder 2 co-star Anne Hathaway.
Verity gave Hathaway her third number one film at the box office in 2026, following on from The Devil Wears Prada 2 and The Odyssey. The former, a long-awaited legacy sequel that was also pretty damn good (and a terrifying reminder of our failing industry), earned $693.3 million worldwide. And the latter is the 11th highest-grossing film of all time, with a hefty $1.76 billion to its name. Not too shabby, eh? Hathaway, who has spent the entire year on an endless press tour while pregnant, also had two other film releases in 2026: Mother Mary and The End of Oak Street. By my calculations, all five movies have, at the time of writing this post, earned well over $2.652 billion.
This is one hell of a victory lap for Hathaway, who can now step away from the red carpet and enjoy the final weeks of her pregnancy in peace. It wasn’t that long ago that we were seeing headlines that she wasn’t a major audience draw. Granted, she has largely focused on indie movies over the course of the 2020s, including sinfully underrated works like Eileen and She Came to Me. But Hathaway’s always been kind of underestimated. Maybe it’s residual skepticism from the nonsensical Hathahate years, which I will forever rant about because they were stupid and toxic. Hathaway has a couple of flops, like the misguided remake of The Witches (which she’s very fun in), but she also has a keen eye for a weirdo indie like Colossal or an appealing commercial rom-com like The Idea of You.
2026 was the year where everything lined up: a slew of major films, a great press tour, and the right audience for it all. Obviously, nobody’s going to give sole credit to Hathaway for the victory lap. Who expected a Christopher Nolan epic to flop? And Colleen Hoover adaptations are one of the safest bets in film right now. Still, she more than deserves her dues. At a time when everyone in the business is panicking about “the lack of headlining stars,” surely Hathaway more than counts as someone who’s getting the job done?
She’s definitely going to end the year as one of its true success stories, but in terms of the queen of the 2026 box office, she has major competition in the form of her The Odyssey co-star Zendaya. Spider-Man: Brand New Day is the third highest-grossing film of all time, with over $2.5 billion in the bank and rising. This Christmas, Dune: Part Three will no doubt be a major player. It’s likely she’ll end 2026 with over $5 billion in grosses to her name. Now, who’s going to cast Zendaya and Anne Hathaway in a two-hander that will make more money than David Zaslav’s retirement package?
