This past week was a special one in the history of Stephen King, as the novel Carrie celebrated its 50th anniversary this past Friday – and this new edition of The King Beat coincidentally also happens to be quite special. In this column, I have not one, not two, but three exclusives to share out of the world of King courtesy of interviews conducted by the CinemaBlend staff.
This feature is packed with good stuff, including the influence of Stephen King on Chucky creator Don Mancini, director Jane Schoenbrun revealing her dream King adaptation, and a behind-the-scenes update about Mike Flanagan’s The Life Of Chuck. Let’s dig in!
Chucky’s Don Mancini Reflects On Stephen King Legacy, His Personal Love Of Carrie, And The Influence Of The Shining On Chucky Season 3
Over the last 36 years, Don Mancini has left an indelible mark on horror fiction. Back in the 1980s, he wrote the script for Child’s Play and created the killer doll known as Chucky, and the slasher character has since become a cinematic icon – appearing in eight movies (seven of which Mancini wrote) and his own TV series (which Mancini showruns). The filmmaker holds an important place in genre history – and knowing that, it probably won’t surprise anybody to learn that a key influence on him from a young age was the work of Stephen King.
The Chucky TV series premiered the second half of its third season this week, and when I had the chance to interview Don Mancini this past Monday and talk about the show, I took the opportunity to ask about his relationship with King’s works. It turns out that he was not just a fan from the very beginning – devouring the author’s early novels as a teenager – but he considers Carrie to be one of his all-time favorite horror stories. The writer/director explained,
He came into the pop consciousness and the culture as an author when I was a teenager, so I was the perfect age. All of his first books – Carrie, Salem's Lot, The Shining, The Stand – I lapped it all up in succession, and I think the Dead Zone was after that, Christine… I could keep going [laugh]… Stephen King meant a lot to me, and Carrie remains my, for what it's worth, official favorite horror movie. 'Cause like a lot of times – I, mean, you must get this all the time too: 'What's your favorite horror movie?' Generally, I say Carrie. It's such a great story; I love the book.
Not only does Don Mancini love both Carrie and the 1976 adaptation, but he made a point of defended the book from one of its standout critics: Stephen King himself. He told me that he has read comments from King disparaging his work compared to what screenwriter Lawrence D. Cohen and director Brian De Palma did with the novel, and he couldn’t disagree more:
I know that Stephen King himself, when talking about the book versus the movie, he's very modest. I mean, he feels that the movie is an improvement on the book 'cause he thought that the book was too narrow-minded, and he didn't think that the epistolary structure worked. I honestly, as a kid, I loved that, because I think it felt fancy or something. It's like, 'Oh, it's like Dracula! Just like Stoker! It's in letters.' And somehow that was like, 'Ooh!' But I thought that that was really interesting, and so I don't think that Stephen King should apologize for that.
As one would expect, Don Mancini has also seen King’s books influence his own creative endeavors. In Chucky Season 3, the eponymous doll takes up residence in the White House because he needs to commit evil acts in an evil place in order to please the voodoo god Damballa, and in the development of the idea, Mancini was in part inspired by the psychic battery that is the Overlook Hotel in The Shining. In his words,
In Season 3, I think I really took a page from The Shining – not in just the obvious ways… but the whole concept of what is going on at the White House I think is very influenced and inspired by a lot of Stephen King mythology, whether it's the Overlook Hotel or the evil that has accrued in Salem's Lot or whatever it is. This notion of like a place where human emotions and thoughts and events have happened in this place and it accrues as a force. I thought that our mythology for the White House was a sort of amusing little spin on that kind of Stephen King mythology.
There are other Stephen King Easter eggs and references to catch as well… but I’ll leave it to you to discover them for yourself by watching the show. Chucky Season 3.5 airs on USA and Syfy simultaneously on Wednesdays at 10pm/9pm Central, and you can stream new episodes the day after they premiere (and the previous seasons) with a Peacock subscription.
I Saw The TV Glow's Jane Schoenbrun Shares Her Dream Stephen King Adaptation
Two weeks ago, my main story for The King Beat centered on a special piece from the New York Times that featured blurbs from notable creatives and professionals talking about how Stephen King’s books impacted their lives. One person who contributed to this piece was filmmaker Jane Schoenbrun, director of the upcoming horror movie I Saw The TV Glow, and when CinemaBlend’s Sarah El Mahmoud got to talk to her this past week, she asked the filmmaker about her dream King adaptation, and she explained that she would love the chance to make a new anthology film based on a few of the author’s short stories. She explained,
I love Creepshow. That was like a sleepover classic for me as a kid. And I love [Stephen King’s] short story collections. I even like this movie Cat’s Eye that no one likes, which was like a Stephen King anthology film from the ‘80s. I think I'm always chasing like the omnibus… I think that's what I would want to do if I was gonna do a Stephen King adaptation – like a little anthology, Creepshow-style.
For what it’s worth, I too have a deep appreciation for Cat’s Eye – putting it at #18 in my ranking of the 20 best Stephen King adaptations.
But Jane Schoenbrun wasn’t done there, as she also had a hot take to deliver. While George A. Romero’s Creepshow is beloved – featuring amazing segments including “The Lonesome Death Of Jordy Verill,” “Father’s Day,” and “The Crate” – Schoenbrun explained that she has a special place in her heart for Michael Gornick’s Creepshow 2, particularly the segment based on King’s short story “The Raft.” She continued,
And, Creepshow 2, better than Creepshow 1, quote me on that. Creepshow 2 has the story about the people who are stuck on a lake, like just a small little lake, and they're like in a canoe and there's like a flesh eating bacteria kind of goop in the lake and they can’t get back to shore. And I remember watching that at a sleepover and then I was like, scared to use the bathroom. Because I was like, ‘What if that thing's in the toilet below?!’
I can’t say I totally concur with Jane Schoenbrun on this one, as I think the segments in Creepshow overall are better than those in Creepshow 2 – but we are certainly in agreement that “The Raft” is incredibly disturbing and one of the best segments in the entire Creepshow franchise (including the terrible third movie and the Shudder TV series).
Composers The Newton Brothers Reveal They Have Finished The Life Of Chuck Score
Hollywood history is full of brilliant filmmaker/composer partnerships, from Sergio Leone and Ennio Morricone to Steven Spielberg and John Williams, and one of the great developing bonds in 21st century cinema is the collaboration between writer/director Mike Flanagan and Taylor Newton Stewart and John Andrew Grush, collectively known as The Newton Brothers. The musician duo has composed the scores for all of Flanagan’s film and television projects going back to Oculus in 2014 – and that includes the Stephen King adaptations Gerald’s Game and Doctor Sleep.
Their latest collaboration is The Life Of Chuck, based on King’s novella of the same name, and this past week, The Newton Brothers told CinemaBlend’s Adam Holmes that they have already completed work on the music for the upcoming film. Stewart told him,
We just wrapped on Life of Chuck, so we definitely know what we did with that score [laughs]. But yeah, Mike is so talented. He’s an incredible musician, editor, writer, director. Every time he does a new project, it’s always exciting because it needs to evoke something new. It’s never just like, ‘We’ll just reuse this.’ It’s always starting from scratch, it’s always doing something fresh, and that’s very exciting for composers. So that’s always a gift working with him on that.
Marvel fans worldwide have recently been enjoying The Newton Brothers work on the Disney+ animated series X-Men ’97, but we can certainly expect the somber drama in The Life Of Chuck to feature a very different score – and apparently the work is quite different from what they did on Gerald’s Game and Doctor Sleep as well.
Adam also inquired if there have been any discussions had about Mike Flanagan’s dream adaptation of The Dark Tower, which is presently in development, but the composers said that it hasn’t come up just yet:
Taylor Newton Stewart: As far as The Dark Tower, I haven’t heard anything official on that. Have you heard anything, Andy, on that?
John Andrew Grush: No, I’m not sure where that’s at. But like Taylor said, we just finished Life of Chuck, so we’re really excited for everyone to see that film. It’s a very special film.
Sadly, we don’t yet know when we’ll get to see The Life Of Chuck, but an announcement of a distributor and release date is anticipated with bated breath, and you can be sure that you’ll find that news here on CinemaBlend when it goes live.
Recommendation Of The Week: “Ur”
For the past month, the world has been obsessed with NCAA Women’s Basketball and the outstanding athleticism of Iowa Hawkeyes guard Caitlin Clark. The championship game of the March Madness tournament played out this past Sunday, and in celebration of that event, I’ve let it inspire my Recommendation Of Week. To be fair, “Ur’ isn’t specifically about women’s college basketball, but the sport does play a key part in the short story.
Originally published as a Kindle exclusive in 2009 before being revised and collected in the 2015 omnibus the Bazaar Of Bad Dreams, “Ur” centers on Wesley Smith, an English teacher at a Kentucky University who finds his life thrown for a loop when his girlfriend, the coach of the school’s talented women’s basketball team, breaks up with him. In a strange act of spite and decision to go “new school,” he purchases his first e-reader… but what arrives is unexpected. Not only is the device pink instead of the standard white, but it somehow has the capacity to access alternate dimensions – known as URs – and download the books of famous authors from around the multiverse. He’s mesmerized and lightly scared by the capacities of the mysterious technology… but that fascination and fright turns to true terror when he discovers the UR News function, which allows him to access future editions of the local newspaper.
That wraps up this week’s edition of The King Beat, but I’ll be back with a new column next Thursday here on CinemaBlend. While you wait for the next King-centric roundup, you can learn about the full history of King’s works being adapted for film and television with my series Adapting Stephen King.
