Round-Up: Box Office, Twilight, and more

• Madagascar 2: Escape from Africa whooped some serious ass--pardon my French, children--this weekend, taking in $63.5 mil. For the adults, it was painful to see that Seth Rogen's Zack and Miri Make a Porno dropped three spots to #5 and has only reached $20 mil in its second week, whereas Paul Rudd's Role Models debuted at #2 with $19 mil. While that does bode well for young actors Bobb'e J. Thompson and Christopher Mintz-Plasse (Superbad), it doesn't say much about the future of comedy or Sean William Scott's acting career, since his first hit in a long (long) time is kid-centric. Soul Men, one of the last three films Bernie Mac shot before passing away, came in at #6 with nearly $6 mil, but managed a fairly praising review from the New York Times. Repo! The Genetic Opera, or as I like to call it The Last Time Anyone Will Ever Ask Paris Hilton to Sing in a Movie, Fingers Crossed, was released in 8 theaters and grossed $51, 600. Needless to say, critics weren't even a little bit interested. Lastly, the indie that grossed the most per theater, despite only premiering in seven, was the Holocaust-from-a-child's-perspective drama, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, which received mixed reviews--both butchered by the NYTimes and EW, and heralded by Variety and Hollywood Reporter.
• Paul Haggis almost created a subplot where Bond discovers that Vesper Lynd had a child in Quantum of Solace--a child, not his child--but then he nixed it.
• Chris Rock plans on remaking a perfectly good British comedy called Death at Funeral that hit theaters last year. Before you know it we'll be remaking films weeks after they hit theaters in desperation for "new" material. The film is about a guy who has to organize his father's funeral and execute a civilized gathering, despite the fact that all of his father's dirty secrets are unraveling and leading to comical blackmail situations that involve a gay midget. Rock will simply copy the disastrous gossip-ridden funeral template and run with it all the way to the bank.
• Both Casey Affleck and Jessica Alba will step into familiar roles in the upcoming adaptation of the Western noir The Killer Inside Me. Affleck returns to the genre that helped put him on the map, playing a sheriff who slowly disintegrates into a vicious murderer, and Alba will play a prostitute, which, for her, is practically effortless at this point.
• Baz Luhrman has a tough decision to make in the coming weeks as test audiences aren't too keen on the ending (spoiler alert) of his epic romance Australia, starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman. Although, I'm sure after they get the stamp-of-approval from "Oprah" this week, that will be irrelevant.
• NBC is reworking "Knight Rider" yet again--third time could be the charm. They've dropped three actors (Sydney Tamiia Poitier, Yancey Arias and Bruce Davison) and plan on moving away from the "terrorist-of-the-week" plot line and doing more of a "Burn Notice"-type format, where he helps everyday people with the help of his awesome car.
• Lastly, TONIGHT!!!! Twilight's Robert Pattinson will introduce an exclusive clip of the film during "Heroes" at 9PM.