The Director Of GERALD’S GAME Wants To Adapt DOCTOR SLEEP
Gerald's Game is one hell of a film; easily the best Stephen King adaptation in a year filled with pretty damn good ones (what with both IT and 1922 also having dropped). But writer/director Mike Flanagan isn't ready to stop going to the author's section on his bookshelf yet, as he wants to bring another somewhat oddly received (at least by fans) entry into the horror titan's bibliography to the screen.
Speaking with the King fansite, Lilja's Library, Flanagan said:
“[T]he ones I’d want to do the most are Doctor Sleep and Lisey’s Story. In both cases, it’s because I identify with the protagonists so much. Lisey’s Story is a stunning piece of work, a beautiful exploration of marriage. And who wouldn’t want to venture back into the world of Danny Torrance?”
Now Lisey's Story may actually be a perfect fit for Flanagan, as it'd be a solid companion piece to Gerald's Game. The story of a novelist's widow, who begins to confront what her marriage actually meant following her partner's death (all while she's being stalked by one of his insane fans), it's King confronting his own shittiness as a man and husband, while also envisioning what life would've actually been like for his wife (Tabitha) had that van actually killed him back in '99.
While that'd all be great, the sexier story here is Flanagan name-dropping Doctor Sleep, as it'd see the horror workman tackling a rather divisive (and honestly, downright disliked) follow-up to one of King's greatest works, The Shining. Doctor Sleep picks up with Danny Torrance, now an alcoholic like his father, who settles in as a hospice worker in New Hampshire. In-between AA meetings, he soothes patients to their death (with the help of a clairvoyant cat), and eventually gets caught up in a calamity involving a cult of ritual murder pseudo-immortals. It's a weird book.
But, if anyone could mine this material for a solid King movie, it might be Flanagan. Obviously, this is still very much "just a guy talking", but it'd be interesting to see if he pursues either project the same way he pursued Gerald's Game, which he apparently had been envisioning/pitching for years before he actually got it made with Netflix (where you can currently find it).
