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Poster for Akeelah and the Bee
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Released
2006 · FILM

Akeelah and the Bee

A gifted teen from a troubled home battles self‑doubt and relentless competition to claim victory in the national spelling bee, discovering the power of perseverance and community along the way.

“Changing the world... one word at a time.”

Directed by
Doug Atchison
Written by
Doug Atchison
Rated
MPA · PG
Runtime
112 min
DramaFamily

Synopsis

Akeelah is a young, gifted girl from a dysfunctional family who is close to quitting school. She discovers she has a high aptitude for spelling and decides to enter a spelling bee contest.

Credits

Actors
Editor
Production Designer
Director of Photography
Writers
Director

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How many hands made this film

The scale of the collaboration

A crew of 224+ credited

Why a floor?

This is a minimum, not a total. We only count the credits we’ve captured so far, and coverage is uneven — a blockbuster might show a few hundred names while another of the same size shows a couple dozen. The real crews all ran into the thousands. The number here only grows as full credits are enriched — so we frame it as a floor, never a headcount.

Craft leads on file

Edited by Glenn FarrShot by M David MullenScored by Aaron ZigmanDesigned by Warren Alan Young

Box Office

2006 · Box office

⚖️ Fell short of break-even — grossed 2.4× its budget

Why 2.5×?

Cinemas keep roughly half of every ticket sold, and a wide release’s marketing often costs about as much again as the film — so a movie needs to gross around 2.5× its production budget just to break even theatrically. It’s a rule of thumb, not the studio’s ledger (home video and streaming come later).

Worldwide gross

$18.9M

Budget$8.0M
Worldwide gross$18.9M
break-even (2.5×)

US & Canada: $18.8M — 99% of worldwide · International: $100K (1%)

Opening weekend: $6.0M — 32% of its US run.

Opening week (7-day): $7.3M — 39% of its US & Canada run.

Peak 2,195 theaters

Also known as

  • Akeelah ist die Größtede
  • Les Mots d'Akeelahfr
  • Una parola per un sognoit

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