I'm reposting this with an updated link. Cool news! The picture is from Perez Hilton's site.
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This is seriously a "no surprise" type of news day for King fans. Guess what. . . Javier Bardem has been signed to star in the movie and TV adaptations of Stephen King's "Dark Tower" book series! Look surprised everyone. Good.
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Here's how andhranews.net shared the story: .
Bardem will play Roland Deschain in the eagerly awaited Ron Howard and Brian Grazer adaptation of King's beloved seven-novel saga.It's a momentous deal because each of the three movies in the series is to be followed by a TV miniseries.
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"Bardem has signed on to the first movie and the miniseries, but the intention is that he will star in all three movies and each of the TV series. It's an enormous deal for any actor, but Bardem was always the first choice," the New York Post quoted a well-placed source as saying. The first movie is due for production in September with Howard directing..
Read more: http://www.andhranews.net/Entertainment/2011/Javier-Bardem-star-movie-TV-adaptations-2945.htm#ixzz1KeJKDyYb
http://perezhilton.com/2011-04-26-javier-barden-dark-tower-series-officially-signed-on
Now to cast Jake, Eddie, Susannah, Callahan, Susan Delgado, Young Roland, Mort (the Pusher), Cuthbert, Stephen Deschain, the Man in Black, etc...
ReplyDeleteYes, can't wait to hear who else gets cast.
ReplyDeleteI have to say, this is pretty doggone exciting. Are we REALLY going to get to see "Dark Tower" movies?!? Seems almost unthinkably cool.
ReplyDeleteWhat happened to the talk of a feature of The Stand?
ReplyDeleteWait a minute, wait a minute...
ReplyDeleteHas the gun been jumped somewhere in all of this? None of the major geek sites (like Ain't It Cool, Dark Horizons, and HitFix) are reporting on this, and I don't see anything about it on Variety or the Hollywood Reporter, either.
Seems like something is a little wonky here.
Lilja's has it posted also.
ReplyDeleteYes, but I'll trust the Hollywood Reporter over Lilja's any day of the week. And Lilja doesn't give a link to where he got the story from.
ReplyDeleteSmells like fish to me. Either that, or (which is more likely) someone in Howard's camp spoke to someone at the NY Post prior to Imagine and Universal putting out press releases. Which probably means that someone at Imagine or Universal is out of a job right about now.
I'm with you, though, in wondering why no news about "The Stand" has hit lately. Then again, new movies of both "Pet Sematary" and "It" (please don't happen) were announced what, like, five years ago? And still no news of them, either.
That's what they call Development Hell in the movie biz, I think.
Hey, I just reposted. But I do see it hitting Perez Hilton, and some other sites. Interestingit's not on Dread Central. maybe the news is so old they aren't bothering!!!
ReplyDeleteKnow who really would be a good pick for Eddie Dean. . . Charlie Sheen. He has that cocky attitude.
For everyone citing all the other actors needed, think about this: The first novel doesn't have a very big cast. I'm not sure how much of the story they'll do in movie 1.
Hah! Charlie Sheen, indeed.
ReplyDeleteYou know what, though, he really and truly wouldn't be bad at all for Henry Dean. He's too old by a coulpe of decades at this point, but otherwise, he'd kinda be perfect.
As for how much of "The Gunslinger" they'll do in the first movie ... yeah, it's that sort of thing that I'm the most curious to find out about. I almost feel like the first movie needs to consist of "The Gunslinger," "The Drawing of the Three," and everything leading up to Jake's drawing in "The Waste Lands." But then, that feels like it might be a lot to get into one movie; they could maybe do it if the movie were three hours, but otherwise, man, that'd be tough.
It's gonna be cool to find out how it all goes; I just hope we aren't all disappointed once it's said and done!
Acually, I think you're right on about that first movie. I'll bet it will be a whopper! How they handle the back story will be interesting. To be honest, I get weary with a lot of flash backs and slow build up.
ReplyDeleteThere are a LOT of funny scenes in Drawing of the Three that should stay. The mobster obsessed with card houses; Detta/Odetta and others.
I can tell you right now what I'd do if I were Ron Howard and Akiva Goldsman: I would rip off Peter Jackson's "The Lord of the Rings." I would rip it off hard and not even bother denying it to anybody.
ReplyDeleteHere's what I mean:
"The Fellowship of the Ring" faced the same problem, that is, of figuring out how to get people interested enough at the very beginning to stay interested through a relatively slow patch that begins the story proper.
So, I'd employ the exact same solution: I'd have an extensive prologue that sets up the backstory, narrated by a character that is extremely prominent later in the story. In this case, I'd have the prologue consist of an opening shot of Roland in the desert, as the narrator delivers the first book's opening line. Then, we'd find out a bit about the Gunslingers, the fall of Gilead, and Roland's quest for the Tower. There could be scenes of the battle of Jericho Hill, similar to the battle of (name escapes me -- Dagorlad?) shown in "Fellowship."
This would lead into Roland coming to Tull, and having to escape the trap left for him there by the MiB; that into the Jake storyline; that into catching the MiB. You could probably do all of that in about an hour if you were really efficient with it, and then there's plenty of movie left over.
My assumption at this point is that the tv shows will be almost all flashback. The reason for that is that Universal will want the three movies to be something that work as a trilogy even if you haven't bothered to watch the tv shows. And the tv shows will need to work even if you haven't seen the movies. I'm sure there would be appearances by Bardem and company, probably showing the ka-tet making mostly uneventful progress in their journey -- but it'll probably end up being almost entirely the backstory of Roland and Gilead and so forth.
And that'd be fine by me!