The AfterElton.com Ranking Round-Up: "Milk", "Rudolph" both glow

Welcome to the AfterElton.com Ranking Roundup, a regular feature where we round up the rankings from various sources as to what is, and isn't, hot in gay male entertainment!

Top Gay-Related Theatrical Releases

(From Variety: weekly gross/total gross to date/per-screen average)

1. Milk ($2 million; $4.5 million after 2 wks; $20,000 per screen)
2. Zack and Miri Make a Porno ($250,000; $31 million after 6 wks; $915 per screen)
3. High School Musical 3: Senior Year ( $244,722; $89 million after 7 weeks; $387 per screen)
4. Dostana ($31,000; $1.2 million after 4 wks; $3016 per screen)
5. Were the World Mine ($9,784; $50,323 after 6 wks; $3261 per screen)
6. Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom ($9,015; $526,259 total after 7 wks; $1,803 per screen)
7. Save Me ($4011; $79,530 total after 14 wks; $4011 per screen)
8. Ciao ($2,672; $2,672 total after 1 wk; $2,672 per screen)
9. Breakfast With Scot ($770; $36,919 total after 7 wks; $770 per screen)

The big news of the week, of course, is that Milk continues to clean up in limited release. As the critics' awards are announced in the days and weeks ahead, the producers clearly hope to "go wide" by capitalizing on the buzz and acclaim, exactly as Brokeback Mountain did.

More ratings and analysis after the jump!

Oscar nominations seem inevitable, at least for Penn, Brolin, and Franco, and probaby Van Sant. But will it get a Best Picture nod? And if it (likely) does, might we not end up with a repeat of the Brokeback/Crash upset? In the wake of the spontaneous protests following Propostion 8's passing, it's literally impossible to imagine a movie that's more in tune with the times or in line with the zeitgeist ... which means we should all be prepared to see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button named Best Picture by the members of the Academy.

As HSM 3 nears the end of its U.S. theatrical run, we can see that this movie that grossed an astounding $43 million in its first three days (making it the most successful musical opening of all time) is ending up with a total take only a little over half that, suggesting that the movie never really broke out beyond its "tween" audience (Mamma Mia!, by contrast, opened at "only" $28 million, but went on to gross $144 million domestically).

In premiere news, Ciao (which I loved) opened with decent, but not exceptional numbers at a single theater in New York.

Top Rated Gay-Themed TV Shows

(from Nielsen, for week ending 11/30)

Desperate Housewives

1. Desperate Housewives, ABC (16.1 million viewers, up 3%)
2. Brothers & Sisters, ABC (10.2 million viewers, up 3%)
3. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, CBS (11.8 million viewers)
4. Ugly Betty, ABC (8.3 million viewers)
5. Privileged, CW (2.2 million viewers)
6. As the World Turns, CBS (for week ending 11/28, 2.8 million viewers, up 6%)
7. Gossip Girl, CW (3.1 million viewers)
8. Crusoe, NBC (2.57 million viewers)

Even after four decades, the thinly-veiled gay metaphor Ruldoph continues to draw viewers, winning its timeslot (though viewership was down 18% from last year in the key 18-49 year-old demo). Incidentally, has anyone else noticed what an a**hole Santa is in this story?

Not surprisingly, the new Robinson Crusoe retelling Crusoe (completely gay-subtext-free!) is totally tanking in its new backwater Saturday night slot. Had they listened to me and gone for a "bromance-plus" subtext between Robinson and Friday, Crusoe, and not Merlin, would be the show everyone is talking about right now.