Zac Efron is a big star.
Teen girls shriek and grab at their clothes during his red carpet appearances, the paparazzi record his every move, and he regularly graces the covers of People and US.
But Efron falls short in one important respect: ticket sales.
The disappointing box office performance of Efron’s “Charlie St. Cloud” last weekend shows that -- like other current teen faves Robert Pattinson, Selena Gomez and Miley Cyrus -- Efron has yet to prove his beyond-teen-idol box office chops.
“This was supposed to prove that his appeal was beyond teen girls, and obviously it didn’t,” Jeff Bock, a box office analyst at Exhibitor Relations, told TheWrap. “He may have to go back to his bread and butter roles, because you only get a few misses.”
The unfortunate thing is that in 
many respects Efron was doing precisely what he should do at this point in his career -- stretch. He even backed out of high-school musical remake "Footloose" for "St. Cloud," a serious look at death and grieving. It was clearly an attempt to show that Efron had more to offer than just an impressively chiseled abs and few nice dance moves.
At a cost of $44 million, “St. Cloud” opened to the low end of expectations with $12.1 million for the weekend. Universal told TheWrap that given the serious nature of the film, the grosses are in line with its expectations. Still with a heavy marketing campaign and a July release date, the studio clearly hoped that Efron’s appeal would be enough to open the movie in the crowded summer season.
In a potentially bad portent for the film’s long-term box office performance, grosses dropped 32 percent from Friday to Saturday.
In fact, last weekend was particularly inhospitable to teen stars. Selena Gomez, a Disney Channel icon from her work on “Wizards of Waverly Place,” saw her film “Beezus and Ramona drop 52 percent, to draw just $3.7 million at the box office.
These modest performances follow a string of whiffs for the current crop of teen icons. Riding high in the "Twilight" series, Pattinson’s “Remember Me” cost just $16 million to make but only grossed $55 million worldwide. Likewise, his “Twilight” co-star Kristen Stewart struck out with her vampire-less role in “The Runaways.”Despite a much-hyped lip-lock with Dakota Fanning, that movie only grossed $3.6 million.
Taylor Lautner had a hit as part of a large ensemble cast with “Valentine’s Day,” but his trial by fire, a starring role in the big-budget action film “Stretch Armstrong” doesn’t arrive until 2012.
Outside of “Twilight,”, the Disney Channel has been the other breeding ground for young talent. Yet stars weaned on the popular kids network have found film success elusive. Miley Cyrus hit only a respectable double when “The Last Song” made $88 million. Not bad for a more adult role for the teen actress, but a far cry from the $155 million "Hannah Montana The Movie" racked up last year.
