Greta Gerwig’s “Lady Bird,” starring Saoirse Ronan and Laurie Metcalfe, has launched with the best limited opening of the year with $375,612 on four screens in Los Angeles and New York for an impressive $93,903 per screen average.

A24 said exit polling shows “sensational” word-of-mouth and universal appeal to both younger and older audiences across the board, and the film boasts a 100% score on Rotten Tomatoes. The film played at the Arclight Hollywood and Landmark in Los Angeles and at the Angelika Film Center and the AMC Loews Lincoln Square in New York City.

The distributor plans to expand into top markets next weekend ahead of a nationwide expansion over the Thanksgiving holiday.

“Lady Bird” topped “The Big Sick” for best average in a platform release this year. Lionsgate-Amazon opened “The Big Sick” to $421,577 at five locations for an $84,315 average on June 23-25, then saw it gross an impressive $42 million in its domestic run.

“Lady Bird” is Gerwig’s semi-autobiographical directorial debut and premiered on Sept. 3 at the Telluride Film Festival. Peter Debruge of Variety gave the film a strong review: “The real surprise is just how honest and personal this film proves to be — again, par for the course with Gerwig, and yet, fairly rare among first-time directors, who haven’t had nearly so much practice simply being real.”

The comedy-drama, set in 2002 Sacramento, follows Ronan’s Lady Bird as she navigates her relationship with her mother (Metcalfe) while simultaneously dealing with pre-college struggles. The film also stars Tracy Letts in the father role and Lucas Hedges and Timothee Chalamet as romantic interests.

Last year’s top platform opening came when Liosngate launched “La La Land” to $881,104 at five locations on the Dec. 9-11 weekend for a spectacular $176,221 average.