Malcolm Henry
If Stephen King did not like the Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 version of ‘The Shining’ then how in the heck is going to like it when they recast Jack Nicholson’s version of Jack Torrence with a Hollywood jokester?
In all seriousness, according to Deadline, the stage play adaptation of the book/movie is set to lock in on BEN STILLER to play the role.
Ben Stiller? Yes, Ben Stiller.
The reports states that the production would kick off in London before it eventually moves to Broadway.
The rest of the crew seems to make much more sense.
Ivo van Hove, whose credits include West Side Story and A View from the Bridge, is set to direct. He will be joined by Simon Stephens (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Morning Sun), who will write the adaptation. Sonia Friedman and Colin Callender, who co-produced Harry Potter and the Cursed Child together, are pairing again for this project.
Stephens’ script (allegedly) will stick closer to the original novel than did the Kubrick film with Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, and Danny Lloyd.
King has famously never been a fan of the film, making that known every chance he can, and to make sure everyone was well away, he was more involved in the 1997 TV miniseries. King also wrote a sequel, Doctor Sleep, in 2013 that would go on to become the basis for Mike Flanagan’s 2019 film.
Van Hove is known for avant-garde stage productions, which could play well with the source material here. Before the pandemic, he staged an experimental reworking of West Side Story — though it did not reopen when Broadway did. His other productions include the 2018 stage adaptation of Network with Bryan Cranston and the 2016 production of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible.
In 2015, he won a Tony for directing Miller’s A View from the Bridge, which marked his Broadway debut and set his star sailing.
Stiller has tried to recut his cloth from comedy into more serious roles, though some (like myself) have a hard time not thinking of him as Zoolander or the bad guy at GloboGym in Dodgeball. He recently starred in the HBO Max movie Locked Down as well as Brad’s Status, The Meyerowitz Stories, and (unfortunately) Zoolander 2. He also signed to direct a film adaptation of Rachel Maddow’s podcast Bag Man, which centers on the 1973 scandal that brought down Vice President Spiro Agnew.
No matter how this is spun, I do not want Ben Stiller in The Shining. Whoever cast that needs fired.
