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The midnight showing of the film Michael Jackson’s This Is It, a collection of rehearsal footage shot just before his death in June, made an “unprecedented” $2.2 million at the box office on Tuesday night (Oct. 27), according to the film’s distributor Sony. That figure, unusually high for a Tuesday in October, had doubled by Wednesday afternoon as fans of the late singer made their way to matinees.
In Los Angeles Will Smith, Paula Abdul, Neil Patrick Harris and Jennifer Lopez were among the stars who joined the Jackson family for the red carpet premiere at the Nokia Live theater.
Jackson had been rehearsing for his come back concert tour when he died on June 25 at the age of 50 from an overdose of the powerful anesthetic propofol and the sedative, Lorazepam. In August the Los Angeles medical examiner ruled his death a homicide, with police and prosecutors zeroing in on Jackson’s personal physician, Dr. Conrad Murray, as the main suspect in his death.