With many of us -- most of us -- rolling our eyes in disgust at the idea of a prequel to The Shining, I thought it was worth noting King's comments on the Hotel's past.
I was reading through Stephen King goes to Hollywood, when this quote got my attention:
“My screenplay, which Kubrick chose not to use, was considerably different from the script that came out at his end. For one, my screen play was pegged even more heavily than the book on something Kubrick never touch on: the past of the hotel. It says in ‘Salems Lot, ‘An evil house calls evil men.’ That was the idea in THE SHINING. The hotel was not evil because those had been there, but thsoe people went there because the place was evil.”
–Speaking of The Shining with Christopher EvansKing is saying that the Hotel's past matters to the texture of the story. Of course, I think King's version of The Shining (the ABC mini-series) gave a lot of history and back story. I enjoyed that Mini-series a lot! I wonder how much of King's original script, the one given to Kubrick, was used to create the mini-series. I wonder what happened to that script.
I suspect that screenplay is the property of Warner Bros., which means they could use it if they want to.
ReplyDeleteInteresting!
I think King, if he's smart maintains an iron clad grip on his screenplays as his own property.
ReplyDeleteHowever, you're right about the hotel's past mattering. In truth though, I don't see how a prequel film can work. One of the reasons was outlined by King himself.
In on writing King says: The important things to remember about back story is (a) everyone has a history and (b) most of it isn't very interesting.
This also explains why he referred to Tolkien's Silmarillion in the same book as "That galumphing dirigible of an epilogue". It's because it was all back story and back story can never be as interesting as main story.
I know there are some who look forward to the idea of a prequel, though I can;t for the life of me understand why. My honest opinion is it depends on how much you care abotu stories as stories, maybe those who aren't as invested in them are therefore more able and flexible to go along and get along with whatever comes along. The rest probably care a little too much.
ChrisC
Well, King's comment about "The Silmarillion" is one of the rare examples of him completely failing to understand the book he was talking about. I'd describe it as many things -- brilliant, maddening, frustrating, and incredible come to mind, along with "dense as hell" -- but I would not by any means describe it as being just a backstory.
DeleteIf anything, "The Lord of the Rings" was a mere footnote to it!
As for King's screenplay, he'd likely have zero control over it unless he wrote it on spec with no contract. Studios tend to not work that way. It's possible the Kubrick estate owns it, rather than Warner Bros., but that also seems unlikely.
In my review of the Kubrick version of The Shining, I noted the omission of the hotel's history. Also all but deleted are references to Jack's alcoholism.
ReplyDeleteThe 1980 Kubrick film was all about claustrophobia. The story in Kubrick's film was thin, but it was so heavy on atmosphere, so well shot and so well directed, it turned out to be one of the all time great horror films.
IMDB credits Kubrick and Diane Johnson as the screenwriters for the 1980 movie.
King's screenplay was unused, but he definitely wrote one. There is a section about in in Rocky Wood's book "Stephen King: Uncollected, Unpublished."
DeleteWhat isn't clear is whether he ever actually sold the screenplay. It's entirely possible that he wrote it just for the experience of writing it, in which case -- obviously -- Warner Bros. would have zero rights to it in any way. If, however, he was hired by Warner Bros. to write it, the odds are quite good that they still own it, and could therefore use it in any way they saw fit.
I'll be interested to see where this goes.