Exploring Stephen King’s “dollar babies” initiative
There are only a small number of modern writers who are globally recognised by name, with such authors being restricted to the likes of J.K. Rowling, George R. R. Martin and Stan Lee. Yet, none of these names may compare to the outreach of the American novelist Stephen King, an iconic author who penned some of the darkest tales of the 20th century, including The Shining, Pet Sematary and Carrie.
Many of King’s novels have since become iconic, translated into countless languages and adapted into TV shows, movies and even video games, with films like The Shawshank Redemption even becoming considered an all-time great. But what about King’s lesser-known stories that are rarely discussed in classrooms or on movie fan pages? Well, King calls these tales his ‘Dollar Babies’.
Coined by the author himself, a Dollar Baby refers to the projects that he shares with film students and aspiring filmmakers who are trying to make it in the industry. Giving hopeful creatives the chance to adapt his stories, King offers a number of his minor projects out in return for just $1, with the only catch being that the filmmakers can’t distribute the films and they have to send the writer himself a finished copy of the final film.
This programme was started by King back in 1982, though he only publicly acknowledged it in 1996, stating in the introduction of The Shawshank Redemption: The Shooting Script, “Around 1977 or so, when I started having some popular success, I saw a way to give back a little of the joy the movies had given me”.
Continuing, King recalls, “’77 was the year young filmmakers – college students, for the most part – started writing me about the stories I’d published (first in Night Shift, later in Skeleton Crew), wanting to make short films out of them. Over the objections of my accountant, who saw all sorts of possible legal problems, I established a policy which still holds today. I will grant any student filmmaker the right to make a movie out of any short story I have written…so long as the film rights are still mine to assign.”
As a long-time film fan and bastion of unabashed creativity, this programme fits exactly in line with King’s values and has proven to be a successful venture too. Working with several Dollar Baby filmmakers since its inception, the initiative has even led to one significant filmmaking career, with the longtime King collaborator Frank Darabont being one of the first to work with the author for just one dollar.
Penning and directing an adaptation of The Woman in the Room, a short story that appears in his 1978 collection Night Shift, Darabont’s film impressed King so much that he allowed the director to distribute the movie commercially. He later became one of the author’s most trusted collaborators, directing The Shawshank Redemption in 1994, The Green Mile in 1999 and The Mist in 2007.
Speaking to Lilja’s Library about finding success with the Dollar Baby, Darabont stated: “I wrote Steve King my letter, he said yes, and it took me three years to make The Woman in the Room…I spent that entire year with a borrowed Moviola in my bedroom, editing the film. I had heaps of 16mm film piled all over the place. At night, I had to move all the piles of film off my bed onto the floor so I could go to sleep.”
You can take a look at a very grainy version of Darabont’s original Stephen King adaptation below.
