Zac Efron Flexes His Box-Office Muscle

By Stephen M. Silverman

04/19/2009 at 01:30 PM EDT

Nice guys finish first: Zac Efron proved he's a potent marquee name, as his new movie 17 Again grabbed the gold among new releases this weekend, with an estimated North American gross of $24.1 million, its very pleased studio, Warner Bros., said Sunday.

Original box-office projections for the PG-13 movie had been in the low $20 million, say industry sources, so the final take had Dan Fellman, Warners president of domestic distribution, telling Reuters, "We're going to have some legs on this film."

The other teen idol strutting her stuff in the Cineplex is Miley Cyrus, whose tween musical-comedy Hannah Montana: The Movie, slipped to fourth place at the box office, with an estimated $12.7 million take since Friday. So far, in 10 days, that movie's made a still-respectable $56.1 million.

In second place at this weekend's ticket booths, Ben Affleck, Russell Crowe and Helen Mirren saw their suspense movie, State of Play, perform only modestly – with about $14.1 million in sales.