The Stephen King adaptation he cherishes the most: “As good as the best”
You know you’ve made it when there’s interest to turn your novel into a movie, so you can only imagine how Stephen King feels, with almost 100 adaptations of his work out there in the world.
You’d feel pretty goddamn smug, wouldn’t you? I know I would. Yet, with all of these adaptations bringing you further acclaim (and money), you also have to reckon with the stress of people misinterpreting your precious work. This was a significant issue for King when Stanley Kubrick approached The Shining, which the author was sorely disappointed by.
He once admitted, “I think The Shining is a beautiful film and it looks terrific and as I’ve said before, it’s like a big, beautiful Cadillac with no engine inside it. In that sense, when it opened, a lot of the reviews weren’t very favourable, and I was one of those reviewers. I kept my mouth shut at the time, but I didn’t care for it much.”
You’d think that with Kubrick in charge of your film, you wouldn’t have to worry, but King believed that the legendary director had wholly misunderstood his characters, especially Jack and Wendy. He hated The Lawnmower Man even more, though, going as far as suing the studio and having his name removed from the credits. That’s what happens when you write a story about a fucking killer lawnmower, I guess.
Sometimes King surprises his fans when he picks out his favourite screen adaptations, often opting for the ones that you least expect, like goddamn Storm of the Century, a 1999 miniseries. While he has had much bigger successes in the TV department, most notably the two-episode-long It, it’s this less well-known series that he prefers. Most interestingly, though, this isn’t technically an adaptation of any of King’s novels. Rather, he wrote the script especially for the screen, which Craig R Baxley then directed.
“My favourite made-for-television production is Storm of the Century. I love that as a piece of work, and I am still very proud of it. In my mind, it is as good as the best of the novels,” he explained (via Hollywood’s Stephen King by Tony Magistrale).
To King, the project simply “worked the way it was supposed to,” from the setting to the performances, especially that given by Colm Feore. “The Storm of the Century is fairly hard-edged for television,” he continued. “It’s not like any other miniseries that you’ll see on any of the other networks – you know, the happy-time, everything-works-out-happily-in-the-end program. It’s very realistic. And everyone who was involved with that show – from my screenplay, to the director, to the set designer, to the producer-we all did Rose Red, and Rose Red is just not as good.”
It’s actually a miracle that King is able to keep track of all of the productions he has been a part of, because with the amount that gets churned out every few years, you’d forgive him for forgetting which adaptations were actually worthwhile. But he can’t forget his favourites, and Storm of the Century sits front and centre in his mind as one of his most accomplished works.
