Select Page

“GERALD’S GAME” director next tackles Stephen King’s “DOCTOR SLEEP”

Friday, January 26, 2018 | News

By MICHAEL GINGOLD

Mike Flanagan, the director who successfully turned Stephen King’s “unfilmable” novel GERALD’S GAME into a terrific movie, will encore with a film version of the author’s DOCTOR SLEEP, the sequel to THE SHINING.

Deadline reports that Flanagan, whose credits also include OCULUS, HUSH, BEFORE I WAKE and OUIJA: ORIGIN OF EVIL, will helm DOCTOR SLEEP for Warner Bros., which released Stanley Kubrick’s classic SHINING film in 1980. Flanagan will also rewrite a previous SLEEP script by Akiva Goldsman (who also co-wrote THE DARK TOWER, so good news there), and his longtime collaborator Trevor Macy will produce, along with Vertigo Entertainment’s Jon Berg. DOCTOR SLEEP picks up with Danny Torrance, the child from THE SHINING now grown up into a troubled adult who is being haunted by ghosts from the Overlook Hotel. He has been quelling both his lingering anger and his psychic abilities with alcohol, but he decides to quit the booze and use his abilities to comfort dying patients at a hospice. He becomes telepathically connected to a similarly gifted young girl, and attempts to help her evade a malevolent group called the True Knot, who have psychic powers of their own. Flanagan and Macy are currently working on a new adaptation of THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE for Netflix.

Michael Gingold
Michael Gingold (RUE MORGUE's Head Writer) has been covering the world of horror cinema for over three decades, and in addition to his work for RUE MORGUE, he has been a longtime writer and editor for FANGORIA magazine and its website. He has also written for BIRTH.MOVIES.DEATH, SCREAM, IndieWire.com, TIME OUT, DELIRIUM, MOVIEMAKER and others. He is the author of the AD NAUSEAM books (1984 Publishing) and THE FRIGHTFEST GUIDE TO MONSTER MOVIES (FAB Press), and he has contributed documentaries, featurettes and liner notes to numerous Blu-rays, including the award-winning feature-length doc TWISTED TALE: THE UNMAKING OF "SPOOKIES" (Vinegar Syndrome).