Comedy movies can be a hard sell at theaters. While they at one time ruled the box office, comedy is subjective, and many of the best comedies in history ended up very successful on home video or even years later when people caught onto what the filmmakers were selling. However, when a comedy movie hits it big, it is massive.
The big thing about a successful comedy is that a top movie star almost always leads them. In the 2000s, the biggest comedy movies of the decade were led by names like Mel Gibson, Jackie Chan, Will Smith, and Jim Carrey. With those names in that era, it was easy to hit a home run. Going through the 2000s year by year, one will find themselves laughing at every highest-grossing comedy.
2000 - What Women Want ($374 million)
In 2000, Mel Gibson took on a rare comedic role in his career, and it was one of his most crowd-pleasing movies. The film was What Women Want and had Gibson star as Nick, a chauvinistic ad executive who was involved in an accident where he suddenly could hear women's thoughts.
While he uses this for his advantage at first, he starts to realize he is in the wrong and is able to repair broken relationships by the end. A gender-swapped sequel came in 2019.
2001 - Rush Hour 2 ($347 million)
Brett Ratner has a bad reputation as a filmmaker who can make a flashy looking movie but one that is often empty under the hood. With that said, he released very successful action comedy movies with the Rush Hour franchise.
What made this movie succeed was the brilliant relationship between Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, a perfect odd couple that sold the entire fish out of water theme. This sequel surpassed the original at the worldwide box office and even led the way to a Rush Hour TV series.
2002 - Men in Black II ($441 million)
In 2002, Men in Black II was the sequel to the super-popular Men in Black from 1997. This time around, Will Smith was back in the Men in Black II cast as a veteran more established agent and teamed with Tommy Lee Jones once again as they went after a new alien, portrayed by Lara Flynn Boyle.
This movie switched things up as Jones' Agent K out of retirement, despite being neuralized and not remembering his past, switching the roles from the first film. At $441 million, it ended up as the lowest-grossing movie of the first three in the franchise.
2003 - Bruce Almighty ($484 million)
Jim Carrey was the biggest money-making comic actor in the '90s, and he was still going strong when the 2000s start. In 2003, Carrey enjoyed another box office hit with Bruce Almighty. In this film, Carrey is a reporter who is down on his luck and blames God for his bad luck.
Morgan Freeman stars as God, who then gave Bruce his powers for one day and sent him on his way to answer everyone's prayers. Bruce ended up learning a significant lesson. This Jim Carrey comedy made $484 million worldwide, the fifth most in 2003, and led to a sequel with Steve Carell taking over the lead role.
2004 - Meet the Fockers ($516 million)
In 2004, Ben Stiller returned for the Meet the Parents' sequel Meet the Fockers. The first film had Stiller heading to meet his fiancée's parents, which included Robert De Niro, in one of his best comedy roles after working as a dramatic actor for decades. This sequel had the inlaws meet each other, with Dustin Hoffman and Barbara Streisand in those roles. The sequel made almost $200 million more than the first movie in the series.
2005 - Wedding Crashers ($283 million)
In 2005, Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn starred in one of the most surprising box office successes of the year with Wedding Crashers. The movie had Wilson and Vaughn as two guys who crash weddings to find women to sleep with.
However, when they crash one wedding, one of them falls in love, and it threatens their entire friendship. The film had a $40 million budget and ended up grossing $283 million at the box office, despite an "R" rating. There is a sequel to Wedding Crashers in development.
2006 - Night At The Museum ($579 million)
In 2006, Ben Stiller created another successful comedy franchise in Night at the Museum, and he was joined in this first movie in the series by the former king of comedy movies, Robin Williams. In the film, Stiller is Larry, a divorced and unemployed father who gets a job as a security guard at a museum.
The selling point here is that, after hours, all the exhibits come to life. The movie made $579 million worldwide, the fifth highest-grossing movie of the year. There were two sequels, and this is one of the franchises that Disney+ plans to reboot.
2007 - Alvin And The Chipmunks ($362 million)
In 2007, Fox decided to reboot the Alvin and the Chipmunks franchise. The characters were based on a virtual band created in 1958 that released novelty music with popular songs remade by the Chipmunks with high-pitched voices.
This was a live-action/CGI hybrid movie with Jason Lee taking on the human role of David Seville, the "father" and producer for the three Chipmunks. The film hit $362 million for the year on a $60 million budget.
2008 - Get Smart ($226 million)
In the 1960s, one of the most popular comedy television series was Get Smart, a spoof of the James Bond movies created by Mel Brooks. In 2008, the property returned as a big-screen movie with Steve Carell and Anne Hathaway in the lead roles as secret agents, with Carell as Maxwell Smart in his early days in the agency. Dwayne Johnson had an early movie role in this movie, shortly before becoming a top-line star himself.
2009 - The Hangover ($465 million)
In 2009, Todd Phillips released a movie that broke all the records for comedy R-rated movies. The Hangover told the story of three guys who wake up after a bachelor party with no memory of the previous night and realize the groom is missing.
The movie made $465 million worldwide and broke the record previously held by Beverly Hills Cop for R-rated comedy films at the box office. Thanks to some of the funniest scenes in movies, The Hangover received two sequels.