As Asia entering the 80's, I think India, South Vietnam, South Korea, Japan, The Philippines, Republic Of China, and People's Republic of China will all be the countries leading into a successful economy. Latin America will also be a successful continent thanks for The Alliance For Progress that started during The Kennedy Administration. President Udall will continue the program that President Kennedy started and hope to continue up to present ITTL.
Blue Skies in Camelot (Continued): An Alternate 80s and Beyond
- Thread starter President_Lincoln
- Start date
So excited! Also given how more assertive and political involved Monroe is in TTL I could see her as a driving force for an earlier #MeToo and galvanising both young and old actresses to stand up against sexual abuse and harassment in Hollywood.An earlier #MeToo movement sounds like exactly the sort of hopeful, better alternative that I want this timeline to represent.I agree that if this movement can attract women from both sides of the political spectrum to open up and share stories about their experiences, then this could indeed be a landmark moment for feminism in general, and awareness of sexual abuse and harassment in particular. In a similar, intersectional vein, I am also interested in writing a major post about the experience of African-American culture and history ITTL.
Also as a suggestion @President_Lincoln depending on what you already have planned, if after a trial of Roman Polanski I think it would be sweet if Monroe and Sharon were to bond after the experience and become close friends. This itself would be Heartwarming In Hindsight considering Monroe's relationship with Jack Kennedy in OTL. Again just a suggestion
As a big fan of Stranger Things I look forward to how the Blue Skies version of it will be once we get to the 2010's. Also as a fan of Winona Ryder in general look forward to her career 🙌Definitely an interesting question!
Also, Winona Ryder is my favorite actress (and more than a bit of a celebrity crush...), so definitely expect updates on her career as it begins.
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this far out, it'll be unrecognizable, if anything like it even exists at all
Genius, I have another question on what's happening and going on to other countries in Europe? Like Denmark, Finland, Norway, Iceland, Belgium, Poland, and Romania? Countries in Asia like Malaysia, Singapore, Burma, Thailand, Papua New Guinea, Brunei, Laos, Lebanon, Bhutan, Nepal, Yemen, and Oman? And the rest of the countries in Africa? Are you going to make a chapter for these countries?
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Broad Strokes on Europe and Asia
This is an excellent question. I would definitely like to give updates on all of the nations of the world. However, it may take me a while to get to all of them. Unfortunately, work and grad school have me very busy these days.
That said, I will try and cover as many countries as I reasonably can in the coming World Affairs updates. I can and will also do my best to answer specific questions in the thread as they come up. To give far too brief overviews...
Europe - Throughout the 1970s ITTL, the European Economic Community continues to grow and develop in Western Europe. As of 1979 ITTL, its members include:
- Belgium
- France
- West Germany
- Italy
- Luxembourg
- The Netherlands
- Denmark
- Ireland
- The United Kingdom
- Greece
Behind the Iron Curtain, there are, as ever, rumblings of dissent as various Eastern European nations chafe under the yolk of the Warsaw Pact and Soviet Domination of their internal politics. The election of Pope Stanislaus in 1978 has already sent some ripples into Poland, his homeland. This will definitely be covered in more detail as we move into the 1980s and those ripples begin to transition into genuine shockwaves. As per OTL, Nicolae Ceaușescu's regime in Romania has pursued a more independent foreign policy from the rest of the Warsaw Pact, recognizing West Germany, and so on. Foreign investment via the IMF and World Bank are helping Romania's economy grow faster than its neighbors. However, political repression in the country is worsening throughout the decade, as its dictator's rule becomes more harsh and arbitrary.
Asia - Political, social, and economic conditions across the world's largest continent vary wildly ITTL's 1979, depending on which country you look at. Again, I will attempt to paint in broad strokes for now.
- Economic Development:
- Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, and a reunited Vietnam often referred to as the "Asian Tigers", are seeing remarkable industrialization and improvements in general living standards. As they become increasingly integrated into the world market, these economies are becoming manufacturing hubs.
- Political Stability and Instability:
- Some nations, such as Japan and India, achieved stable democracies ITTL by 1979. Remember that ITTL, India under Indira Gandhi has maintained relatively warm relations with the United States, over the Soviet Union, which formed an alliance with Pakistan to conduct a joint invasion of Afghanistan, beginning in 1974. As of 1979, South Korea and Taiwain are still living under authoritarian regimes, though that will soon begin to change, as it did IOTL.
- Though the People's Republic of China managed to put the Cultural Revolution and its excesses behind them, thanks in large part to the moderate, prudent leadership of Chairman Zhou Enlai throughout the mid 1970s, Zhou's passing in 1976 presented a fresh challenge. Presently, the country is being led by Hu Yaobang as Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party. Chairman Hu is attempting to begin economic reforms toward liberalization, though politically, he remains relatively harsh and repressive. Hu is also following Zhou's example in playing both sides of the Cold War against each other. For the time being, China is aligned with neither the United States, nor the Soviet Union.
- In Southeast Asia, Vietnamese reunification has had a big impact. Though it is still struggling with internal divisions and the growing pains of a young democracy, Vietnam stands poised to become something of a regional power, if it plays its cards right. Vietnam's war with the People's Republic of China in the mid 1970s will be explored in an upcoming update in more detail.
- Cultural and Social Changes:
- Cultural diversity and traditional values continued to be important across Asia. However, urbanization and globalization began to reshape cultural norms, particularly in major cities. Western influence is becoming more and more noticeable with each passing generation.
- Pop culture, including music, film, and fashion, influenced younger generations. For example, the 1970s saw the rise of Bollywood in India and the emergence of K-pop in South Korea. As time goes on, these trends will eventually become cultural exports to the west as well. As some posters have predicted, with India in particular being a U.S. ally ITTL, expect Bollywood films and other parts of Indian culture to have a much bigger American audience much sooner.
- Technology and Modernization:
- Some Asian countries embraced technological advancements throughout the 70s. Japan, in particular, was often seen as being at the forefront of technological innovation, with the growth of many Japanese corporations during this time period. With the victory of Betamax ITTL, Sony will basically rule the American home video market for many years to come, for example.
To again, briefly cover some major differences from OTL:
1. Iran - The Iranian Revolution still occurred ITTL in 1977 - 1978. However, unlike IOTL, the protests resulted in a constitutional convention, which in turn abolished the monarchy and created a secular, Democratic Republic, which immediately joined the Non-Aligned Movement. Whether this fledgling Iranian Democracy will last remains to be seen, however.
2. The United Arab Republic - Formed from the unification of the Baathist states in Assad's Syria and Saddam Hussein's Iraq, the "United Arab Republic" claims to be the vestige of Nasser's once-bright hopes for a united Arab world. In practice, it is an authoritarian regime built on repression and terror. Hussein, the country's President and dictator, suppresses ethnic and religious minorities, particularly the Kurds, as per OTL. With Syria as a largely Sunni power base ITTL, Saddam is much more confident of his position, even with Iraq's largely Shia population. Will this result in a less paranoid Saddam than IOTL? Probably not. But only time will tell.
3. Saudi Arabia - The recent policy of the Udall Administration, to break off relationships with regimes with poor human rights records has put the US-Saudi relationship in jeopardy of dissolving. Conservatives in the US are loathe to lose what they see as a key American ally in the region. But President Udall refuses to work closely with the Saudis unless they begin to institute basic reforms. The House of Saud is thus biding its time, waiting to see how the American election of 1980 pans out. If Udall wins reelection, they will either need to reform, apply pressure to the American economy using their oil supply, or perhaps pivot toward a new geopolitical position. Due to the Soviet Union's own vast energy reserves, an alliance with the USSR seems unlikely? But perhaps they can agree that the US is making life difficult for them? Maybe the People's Republic of China, whose economy, once it roars to life, will be energy hungry, for sure.
Africa - To try and cover the entire continent of Africa in a post like this would be criminal. I will definitely give Africa its own update in the near future. Apologies, but it feels entirely wrong to me to do otherwise.
Hope this answers some of your questions!
Hold the phone, when did North and South Vietnam reunify? Did I miss something?
During the Bush Administration, around 1975. The US and USSR held a summit and gave the go ahead for North and South Vietnam to reunify and hold elections to a constitutional convention. I don't remember exactly what chapter this occurs in. But I can try and find the answer for you
Thanks. I’m guessing the Vietnamese Workers Party is illegal?During the Bush Administration, around 1975. The US and USSR held a summit and gave the go ahead for North and South Vietnam to reunify and hold elections to a constitutional convention. I don't remember exactly what chapter this occurs in. But I can try and find the answer for you
It is not. One of the conditions for re-unification by the Soviets was that all political parties be allowed to participate. At the moment, the primary political parties are essential coalitions of the left and right wings of the political spectrum. The current President, Trần Văn Hương, is the leader of the "National Social Democratic Front", a Social Democrat, who is acceptable to former ARVN generals due to his personal conservatism.
Are any PAVN generals part whatever the unified Vietnamese Army is called or it it just former ARVN generals?
Yes. My thought was that the two nations (as part of the unification process) would integrate their armed forces. This process would take a while, however. The "unification project", so to speak, is attempting to use Vietnamese nationalism to overcome whatever ideological differences remain between the various political factions throughout the country. With the US and USSR largely keeping their hands off of Vietnam, this is easier than when one side appears to be "actively supported" by would be imperialists.
Well if a certain dictator in neighbouring Cambodia goes crazy and starts cleansing Viet-Cambodians then the former North and South Vietnamese would have a common enemy now wouldn’t they?
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Random idea, but this point in the timeline would be just after Ron Stallworth's investigation into the KKK had the plug pulled on it. Given how differently events have unfolded so far, maybe the investigation is still going on in this timeline, and maybe here it leads to higher ups in the Klan getting arrested?
While I'm on that subject, Ron Stallworth feels like a guy you could do something with, maybe you could have him run for office after the investigation wraps?
While I'm on that subject, Ron Stallworth feels like a guy you could do something with, maybe you could have him run for office after the investigation wraps?
Have a great day genius!
When there's a lot of missing chapters, you got to ask some questions. I'm always curious genius.
Chapter 123
Chapter 123: It Came Out of the Sky - Stephen King’s Works and Adaptations 1974 - 1980
Above: Salem’s Lot, King’s second published novel (left); the “King of Horror” himself (center); and The Shining, first published in 1977, which would become arguably the man’s most iconic work.
“Whoa, it came out of the sky
Landed just a little south of Moline
Jody fell out of his tractor
Couldn't b'lieve what he seen, oh
Laid on the ground shook
Fearin' for his life
Then he ran all the way to town
Screamin', "It came out of the sky" - “It Came Out of the Sky”, Creedence Clearwater Revival
“I am the literary equivalent of a big mac and fries.” - Stephen King
Stephen Edwin King’s life was forever changed when, in 1973, his debut novel, Carrie, was picked up for publication by Doubleday. At the time, King's phone was out of service. He couldn’t afford to pay the bill to keep it connected on his meager English teacher’s salary. Doubleday editor William Thompson—who went on to become King's close friend—sent a telegram to King's house in April 1973 which read: "Carrie Officially A Doubleday Book. $2,500 Advance Against Royalties. Congrats, Kid – The Future Lies Ahead, Bill." With the advance, the fledgling author made a down payment on a Ford Pinto and reconnected his phone line.
Shortly thereafter, New American Library bought the paperback rights for $400,000, which, even split down the middle per King’s contract with Doubleday, was still a fabulous sum at the time. King was flabbergasted. The book went on to be a bestseller and was moderately well-received by critics. Though some in the literary world thought King’s writing overly “schlocky”, to his fans, that was what made it so special.
King also sold the film rights to the novel in 1973, for the modest sum of another $2,500. The author always insisted that he was lucky, however. “To have that happen to your first book, to have someone, anyone in Hollywood take an interest in you, that’s a good sign. I knew better than to look a prize horse in the mouth.” King later remarked.
Though it took several years for the film adaptation of Carrie to hit theaters, when it did, in 1976, it became both a commercial and a critical success. In a decade known for its fantastic horror films, Carrie stood out due to its high school setting, excellent performances by Sissy Spacek (as the titular, tormented teenager) and Piper Laurie (as her abusive, zealot mother), and clear, focused direction by Brian De Palma. It eventually raked in nearly $34 Million at the box office, on a relatively small budget of only $2 Million. Though not every adaptation of King’s works in the years and decades that followed would reach the same levels of success, Carrie got the Maine native off to a great start.
…
Many artists, musicians, writers, and other creative types dread the so-called “sophomore slump”. So alright, you’ve got a hit on your hands. But any chump can score a hit on a fluke. Anybody can get lucky. The mark of true success is being able to do it more than once. To be consistent.
Still teaching high school English in his native Maine at the time, King happened to be teaching a unit on Dracula. He wondered, aloud one night over dinner with his wife, fellow writer Tabitha, what would happen if the famous Count came to America in the year 1974. “He’d probably get run over by a big yellow cab as soon as he stepped out of the Port Authority in New York.” She quipped. King found that he agreed, but the idea never quite left him. The setting gradually shifted, away from a major city, toward a small town. The resulting novel, Salem’s Lot, would later be described as “Dracula meets Peyton Place”.
Salem’s Lot tells the story of Ben Mears, a writer, who returns to his hometown of Jerusalem’s Lot in Maine after 25 years away to try and write his next novel. He quickly befriends high school teacher Matt Burke and strikes up a romantic relationship with Susan Norton, a young college graduate with ambitions of leaving town. Ben’s proposed book is about the “Marsten House” , a decaying, supposedly haunted edifice in which a young Ben suffered a traumatic experience. The house once belonged to a Prohibition-era gangster and shortly into the beginning of the novel, is purchased by a mysterious pair of business partners - Richard Straker and Kurt Barlow. As the novel progresses, the heroes, including a Catholic priest named Father Callahan, come to discover that Barlow is an ancient vampire, and Straker his human familiar.
Once again, the novel swiftly became a success. Critics praised King for “having made vampires fresh again”, and for “forcing popular literature to ‘grow up’ a little.” For his part, the author would later claim that Salem’s Lot was his personal favorite among his books, saying, “In a way it is my favorite story, mostly because of what it says about small towns. They are kind of a dying organism. The story seems sort of down home to me. I have a special cold spot in my heart for it!"
As with Carrie, the film rights to Salem’s Lot were swiftly scooped up, this time by Warner Bros. The studio hoped to turn the 400 page novel into a feature film, while still remaining true to the source material. Obviously, they also hoped to replicate Carrie’s success. Influenced by King’s description of “Dracula meets Peyton Place”, Warner Bros. hired Paul Monash, the creator of Peyton Place, as well as the producer for Carrie to pen the screenplay for Salem’s Lot. Monash worked to adapt the novel, which he considered “lengthy”, into an approximately 2 hour runtime by cutting some minor characters and subplots, and combining some other characters and scenes. Despite the changes, King praised Paul Monash's screenplay and stated “Paul has succeeded in combining the characters a lot, and it works."
Producer Richard Kobritz, who took a strong creative interest in his films, also added several alterations to Monash's script, including changing the lead vampire - Kurt Barlow - from a cultured, human-looking villain (ala Christoper Lee’s Dracula), into a speechless demonic-looking monster. Kobritz explained:
“We went back to the old German Nosferatu concept where he is the essence of evil, and not anything romantic or smarmy, or, you know, the rouge-cheeked, widow-peaked Dracula. I wanted nothing suave or sexual, because I just didn't think it'd work; we've seen too much of it. The other thing we did with the character which I think is an improvement is that Barlow does not speak. When he's killed at the end, he obviously emits sounds, but it's not even a full line of dialogue, in contrast to the book and the first draft of the screenplay. I just thought it would be suicidal on our part to have a vampire that talks. What kind of voice do you put behind a vampire? You can't do Bela Lugosi, or you're going to get a laugh. You can't do Regan in The Exorcist, or you're going to get something that's unintelligible, and besides, you've been there before. That's why I think the James Mason role of Straker became more important."
The next task, of course, was finding a director. A number of regulars in the horror genre, having become familiar with King’s work, were eager to man the helm for the project. In the end, however, Warner Bros. went with Tobe Hooper, following a screening of his 1974 film, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Often considered one of the most seminal horror flicks of all time, Texas Chainsaw’s cannibal Sawyer family were often seen as an allegory for the dark side of American life in the 1970s: the War in Cambodia; chaos in the streets; and a critique of “traditional” American values of the nuclear family. Hooper was happy to be given the nod. Armed with a budget of $4 Million, he set to work.
Besides James Mason, who was immediately cast in the role of Richard Straker, and Reggie Nalder, “the face that launched a thousand trips” as Barlow, the vampire, as well as Elisha Cook, Jr. and Marie Windsor (as Weasel Phillips and Eva Miller, two characters in a relationship, an in-joke by Kobritz due to their prior playing a couple in Stanley Kubrick’s, The Killing), Kobritz next set out to cast his heroes.
He wanted “something of a heartthrob” for Ben Mears, and eventually found him in Lee Majors, who by 1978 and the film’s production, was coming off his five year stint as Colonel Steve Austin in The Six Million Dollar Man, a hit television series for Universal, airing on ABC. Majors, who was sometimes called “the blond Elvis” due to his perceived similarity in appearance to the King of Rock N Roll, brought some much needed star power and name recognition to the production. He was willing to work for relatively little, due to his desire to break back into film over television, now that The Six Million Dollar Man had been canceled due to declining ratings.
Joining Majors as Mears’ love interest, Susan Norton, was Bonnie Bedelia, a daytime soap opera star also looking to break into major motion pictures (and thus, willing to work for less). Rounding out the heroes were Mark Petrie, played by child actor Lance Kerwin, and Father Callahan, a Catholic priest (whose character is largely combined in the film with that of high school teacher Matt Burke from the book). Though Kobritz originally wanted Christopher Lee or Vincent Price for the part, both were busy or wanted too high a figure. Thus, he went with his third choice, English actor Donald Pleasence, who had narrowly missed out on playing Dr. Sam Loomis in John Carpenter’s Halloween to Lee.
In directing the film, Hooper strove to distance himself from the visual style of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. "This film [Salem’s Lot] is very spooky – it suggests things and always has the overtone of the grave. It affects you differently than my other horror films. It's more atmospheric." The director explained. “I tried to create something you could not escape – the reminder that our time is limited and all the accouterments that go with it, such as the visuals.”
Several images from the film, notably Reggie Nalder’s terrifying countenance as Barlow, the glowing-eyed vampires, floating outside of windows, and most graphically, a scene where one character, Cully Sawyer, threatens another, Larry Crockett, with a shotgun, sticking the gun’s barrel directly in his mouth, would become iconic and influential in the horror genre.
When the film eventually premiered in October, 1979, just in time for Halloween, it received largely positive reviews from critics. They praised the film’s eerie atmosphere, cinematography, Hooper’s direction, and scares. The film was also a success at the box office for Warner Bros., who raked in nearly $45 Million. King was very happy with the film. Following its premiere, he felt confident that his own rise to stardom had not “been a fluke”, after all. It would take another year, however, for King’s third novel, and perhaps the most iconic of the film adaptations of his work to debut on the big screen.
…
After the death of King’s mother in 1974, he and his family moved to Boulder, Colorado. While there, he and Tabitha paid a visit to the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park. King recalled an “uncanny” experience that he and his wife shared, as they ate dinner in the hotel’s grand dining room, completely alone. “All the other chairs were turned up, on top of the tables. Apparently, we’d come out of season. I thought about what it would be like to spend an entire winter up there. I got shivers.”
Before the end of that trip, the first half of the initial draft of what would become The Shining was written.
“I called Danny’s powers ‘the Shining’ after that Beatles song.” King later explained, in an interview. “The one where John Lennon sings, ‘Well we all shine on!’. I just liked the sound of that. I thought it fit.”
The Shining centers on Jack Torrance, a struggling writer and recovering alcoholic who accepts a position as the off-season caretaker of the historic Overlook Hotel in the Colorado Rockies. His family accompanies him on this job, including his young son Danny, who possesses "the shining", an array of psychic abilities that allow the child to glimpse the hotel's horrific true nature. Soon, after a winter storm leaves the family snowbound, the supernatural forces inhabiting the hotel influence Jack's sanity, leaving his wife, Wendy, and son in grave danger.
King, who was in the midst of his own struggles with alcohol addiction at the time, began the book, like so many of his stories, as a kind of “what if” scenario. He wanted to explore what would happen if the tendencies he often saw in himself - his dependence on alcohol, his anger - got the better of him, or at least, a character very much like him. In that sense, Jack Torrance was a case of King looking at a shadowy version of himself.
The Shining, eventually published in 1977, is an exploration of its author’s darkest fears about himself, and what he might become, if he wasn’t careful. The story wove influence from Shirley Jackson and Edgar Allan Poe, creating an almost gothic, haunted house setting, full of supernatural terrors, combined with the rising psychological horror and paranoia brought on by extended isolation.
King’s editor at Doubleday, Bill Thompson, tried to talk him out of publishing The Shining. He did this because he thought that three straight horror best-sellers would get his client “typed” as a horror writer. King, however, considered that a compliment, and pushed forward with publication anyway. The book became his third hit in a row.
Due to the highly personal nature of the book, however, King was a bit more choosy when it came time to sell the film rights. Director Stanley Kubrick and screenwriter Diane Johnson (who actually hated the book) sought to obtain the rights to make a film adaptation, which would again be distributed by Warner Bros., at least in the United States. Kubrick was allegedly, “fascinated” by the book, and, wanting “very much” to make a horror film, a genre he was inexperienced in, desired for The Shining to make his mark. For his part, King was honored that such a celebrated director as Kubrick had taken an interest. But when he heard what Kubrick and Johnson’s version would entail, the author was horrified.
For one thing, all of Kubrick’s choices for the leading role - Jack Torrance - were, in King’s words, “all wrong”. First, he wanted relative unknown Jack Nicholson, whom King dismissed for “always looking crazy, right from the get-go”. The author insisted that Torrance begin the film, “seeming like an ordinary guy. The kind you might meet at a grocery store.” That way, once the transformation, his descent into madness, occurred, the audience would be as shocked as he hoped his readers were when they read the novel. Kubrick’s other top picks - Robert De Niro, Robin Williams, or Harrison Ford - were also rejected by King.
King also disliked Johnson and Kubrick’s script, which he felt forced Wendy to, “basically just scream and be stupid. That’s not the woman I wrote about.” King’s conception of Wendy was of a strong, independent woman on both a personal and professional level. Kubrick argued that “such a woman would not long stand the personality of Jack Torrance”. Nevertheless, King refused to budge.
After months of back and forth between the two stubborn creators, and with Warner Bros. getting antsy, wanting very much to secure the film rights, regardless of who directed, the parties involved realized that they were at an impasse. King refused to sell the rights if Kubrick would direct. Kubrick refused to compromise his vision for what he felt the film should be. In the end, they decided to part ways. Kubrick would go on to instead make his horror debut with 1982’s groundbreaking The Colour Out of Space, an adaptation of the H.P. Lovecraft short story of the same name.
“I’ve learned that dead authors are much easier to work with.” Kubrick glowered to reporters.
King, meanwhile, finally sold the film rights to The Shining to Warner Bros. After the “horror” he’d experienced reading Kubrick and Johnson’s script, King decided to adapt the novel himself. His script kept Jack and Wendy’s respective characterization from the novel, as well as other elements which Kubrick and Johnson had wanted to cut, including the topiary of hedge-animals at the hotel, and Jack’s iconic weapon being a roque mallet, rather than an ax. He also maintained the gothic, supernatural tone of his novel, though the psychological horror was still, of course, present. Though Warner Bros. also bought King’s script, many of their executives felt that the author’s attempt remained “too close” to the source material. For several years, the film remained in development limbo, as the studio shopped King’s script around to various screenwriters and directors, seeking a team that could help bring it to fruition.
In the meantime, King’s novel writing career continued to flourish. After returning to Maine in 1975, where King took up a job teaching English at the University of Maine, as well as a brief tour of Europe with his family, King began his fourth novel in earnest. At first, he was interested in writing about the wave of terrorism throughout the 1970s, as well as the idea of a world devastated by plague. But he quickly hit a snag, as he could not find a way to connect the two ideas. Years later, he would recount the experience in an interview:
“For a long time—ten years, at least—I had wanted to write a fantasy epic like The Lord of the Rings, only with an American setting. I just couldn't figure out how to do it. Then . . . after my wife and kids and I moved to Boulder, Colorado, I saw a 60 Minutes segment on CBW (chemical-biological warfare). I never forgot the gruesome footage of the test mice shuddering, convulsing, and dying, all in twenty seconds or less. That got me remembering a chemical spill in Utah, that killed a bunch of sheep (these were canisters on their way to some burial ground; they fell off the truck and ruptured). I remembered a news reporter saying, 'If the winds had been blowing the other way, there goes Salt Lake City.'”
“Before I knew it, I was deep into The Stand, finally writing my American fantasy epic, set in a plague-decimated USA. Only instead of a hobbit, my hero was a Texan named Stu Redman, and instead of a Dark Lord, my villain was a ruthless drifter and supernatural madman named Randall Flagg. The land of Mordor ('where the shadows lie,' according to Tolkien) was played by Las Vegas. I thought that sounded about right.”
The Stand, widely considered a contender for King’s masterpiece, is truly an epic. It too would eventually be adapted into a pair of widely-acclaimed films by horror legend George A. Romero in the mid 1980s. But that is a story for another time. King would also publish The Dead Zone, a novel about a car-accident victim who develops psychic powers in 1979. Its film adaptation, by David Cronenberg, will likewise be explored in the next King update.
…
Let us close our chronicle on the “King of Horror” for the time being then, by returning to The Shining, which would, in 1980-1981, finally be made into a feature film.
The key moment came when Richard Kobritz, who decided to return as producer for The Shining caught a midnight screening of the 1977 surreal horror film Eraserhead by American auteur David Lynch in Los Angeles. Kobritz would later exclaim, “it was like a lightbulb went on above my head. I thought, ‘this guy would be perfect for adapting Steve’s book.’”
Initially, King himself was dubious.
He appreciated Eraserhead when he viewed it. “It made me downright uncomfortable.” He later remarked. But he also found it “artsy and weird”. He feared that if Lynch were to direct The Shining, it might become too experimental. That the story he was trying to tell might be lost in translation yet again. Reassurance came when King saw Lynch’s second film, The Elephant Man, released in 1980. This latter film, a biopic, starred John Hurt as Joseph Merrick, the real-life celebrity of Victorian medicine, born with several deformities, but whose quest to be seen as human resulted in a moving picture that King admitted, “got even me a bit misty eyed at points.” Though The Elephant Man did have scenes of surrealist imagery, the film was much more “typical” in its narrative structure than something like Eraserhead. King gave Kobritz the green-light to arrange a meeting with Lynch.
At first, Lynch too was reluctant to take on the film. His real passion project at the time was a film he’d been developing for years entitled Ronnie Rocket. This film would concern the story of a detective seeking to enter a mysterious second dimension, aided by his ability to stand on one leg. He is being obstructed on this quest by a strange landscape of odd rooms and a mysterious train, while being stalked by the "Donut Men", who wield electricity as a weapon. Besides the detective's story, the film was to show the tale of Ronald d'Arte, a teenage dwarf, who suffers a surgical mishap, which leaves him dependent on being plugged into a mains electricity supply at regular intervals. This dependence grants him an affinity over electricity which he can use to produce music or cause destruction. The boy names himself Ronnie Rocket and becomes a rock n roll star, befriending a tap dancer named Electra-Cute.
Lynch had originally wanted to make Ronnie Rocket immediately following Eraserhead. But when he realized that the film would be far too expensive to produce without investors or major studio backing, he begrudgingly looked for finished scripts to direct. That was how he’d landed on producer Mel Brooks’ radar, who tapped him to direct The Elephant Man. Still lacking the capital to finance Ronnie Rocket, however, he agreed to take the meeting with King and Kobritz. He even read the copy of The Shining that Kobritz had mailed to him, to prepare.
The meeting, at a hotel restaurant in Los Angeles, went far better than either man expected. Lynch and King could both relate to each other’s desire for creative control over their work. They both had complicated childhoods, which led to tumult in their personal lives at times. And both held an appreciation for the “duality of American life” - the white picket fence, innocence on one hand, the dark, brutal underbelly on the other. Lynch told King that he “enjoyed” his book, particularly the dream and nightmare sequences, and the character of Danny, whom King agreed should be the “central protagonist” of the film. After finishing their lunch, it came time for Kobritz, representing Warner Bros. and Lynch to come to a decision.
Lynch agreed to direct the film adaptation of The Shining, on a few conditions.
One, he wanted to make a few edits to King’s script. Specifically, he wanted to hire a friend of his, young TV writer Mark Frost, to tweak some of its “clunky” dialogue. He also wanted to play up the “dreamlike” atmosphere, blurring the lines between reality and the supernatural. That uncertainty, he argued, would be critical to the film’s sense of dread. Lynch wanted the film to have a slow, ominous pace, that gradually built until the climactic explosion of the Overlook’s boiler at the climax. This, he believed, would, in part, be a symbolic self-destruction of American greed and worship of industrial technology, themes Lynch was interested in exploring. King approved of these additions, and the two shook hands and parted ways. Production on The Shining began in the autumn of 1980.
“Everyone involved,” Richard Kobritz later remarked, “held their breath regarding casting.” “After all, that had been one of the real sore spots between Stanley and Steve several years prior.”
During their initial meeting in Los Angeles, the author stressed to Lynch his insistence that the lead, whoever would play Jack Torrance, had to, at least initially, come off as a real nice guy. Lynch, agreeing, immediately suggested Jack Nance, his friend from the American Film Institute, who had played the lead in Eraserhead, and whom Lynch had tried (and failed) to get cast as Joseph Merrick in The Elephant Man. Kobritz balked.
He’d enjoyed Nance’s performance in Eraserhead. But Nance was a virtual unknown in Hollywood. Besides Eraserhead, Nance’s filmography was almost exclusively bit parts in B-movies. He had, in the mid 1960s, been a player at the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco. During his time there, he’d found success and critical acclaim in the lead role in a play based on the life of American founding father Thomas Paine.
This was all well and good, but Kobritz knew that his bosses back at Warner Bros. would scream bloody murder over Nance as Jack Torrance. The studio wanted a bankable star to help “sell” the film to non-horror fans. King, when pressed by Kobritz on this issue, suggested a couple: Jon Voight; Michael Moriarty; or Martin Sheen. Lynch agreed to have these three come in for screen tests, but asked that his friend, Jack Nance, be shown the same courtesy. Kobritz agreed, wanting to maintain good relations with Lynch, since they would be working together to finish the film.
Contrary to everyone (except Lynch’s) expectations, Nance’s performance as Jack Torrance in the screen tests absolutely stole the show. A quiet, somewhat shy man, with a short (5’6”), lean frame, Nance astounded everyone on set with the level of pathos he was able to inject into the character. Contrary to the book’s description of Jack Torrance as a “moderately tall, muscular” man, Nance’s Jack Torrance seemed, at first glance, sensitive and introspective. His small stature made it easy for a prospective audience to underestimate him. Nance, who had also read the novel when he heard his friend, Lynch would be directing the film, played the character as smart, cynical, but relatable during the early scenes, where he is interviewed by Stuart Ullman, the Overlook’s fussy, self-serious manager (played by Harry Dean Stanton). Later, he smolders, his anger slowly building until it explodes into a furious rage at the film’s climax.
The crew and even Warner Bros. executives were so blown away by Nance’s screen tests, that the latter agreed to let Lynch cast Nance as Torrance, though they would pay him significantly less than the would have ever dared to offer Voight, Moriarty, or Sheen. Nance, just happy to have a chance to break out a bit, accepted the lower pay.
Though Lynch had wanted to cast Nance’s real-life wife, Catherine E. Coulson, as Wendy Torrance, the studio put their foot down and demanded he go with someone more well known. In the end, after auditioning several actresses, including Goldie Hawn and Jessica Lange, Lynch and Kobritz settled on Meryl Streep, an up and coming star whom Warner Bros. hoped to build a relationship with so that they could get her to come back for future productions. Jazz legend and voice-over star Scatman Crothers was tapped to star as Dick Hallorann, the Overlook’s cook who teaches Danny Torrance (played by Sean Astin) about his power, the mysterious “Shining”. After reviewing the screen tests, particularly Nance’s and Streep’s, King was pleased with what he saw.
Though largely filmed on-location at the Stanley Hotel in Colorado, the film also featured several sections that had to be shot on a soundstage in Los Angeles. These would include the nightmare sequences, including the scene where “Tony”, Danny’s imaginary friend, shows Danny what his father will do to him and his mother if he doesn’t get away from the Overlook. The blood-scrawled “REDRUM!” would become especially iconic.
To create the film’s score, Lynch tapped Angelo Badalamenti, a relatively unknown film composer at the time. His work, which paid meticulous attention to not just the music but the film’s overall sound design, created a haunting, atmospheric soundscape that served to heighten the tension and bring the eeriness of the Overlook to life.
The film also bore Lynch’s striking visual style. Emphasizing the hotel’s unsettling and mysterious qualities, Lynch helped turn the Overlook into a proverbial maze of creaking doors, leaking faucets, lurking shadows, and inhuman machinery. In the end, The Shining would not be released to US cinemas until Labor Day weekend, 1981. When it arrived, however, it changed the horror genre forever.
Initial reviews at the time were mixed, a first for a King adaptation. The New York Times praised the performances of the leads, particularly Meryl Streep, but criticized what they felt were “bizarre” direction choices from Lynch, whose surreal style they felt detracted from the “emotional core” of King’s story.
On the other hand, Roger Ebert gave the film four stars out of four, a rare feat for him when it comes to horror, a genre he famously disliked. He praised the “relatively unknown” Nance, who manages to “deliver a compelling performance, and almost, almost makes you forgive him for everything he’s put his family through when he runs back and sacrifices himself to destroy the Overlook at the film’s conclusion”. Unlike the Times, he lavished praise on Lynch, calling his surreal style, “visionary”, and claimed that “The Shining will serve as a fine feather in David Lynch’s cap, right alongside The Elephant Man. Anyone who thinks that Lynch is just an art-house auteur, must first watch these two films before arriving at that opinion.”
Retrospective reviews were almost universally kind to Lynch and his vision. The film is now widely regarded as a “masterpiece” of the horror genre, and one of the most influential films of all time. As of 2023, the film holds an 85% “certified fresh” rating on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes. Though Kubrick fans would always pine for what could have been if he’d been allowed to take a crack at adapting King’s novel, fans of the book and of Lynch argue that he managed to not only remain faithful to the source material, but imbue his film with his own unique energy.
The Shining would not mark the final collaboration between Lynch and Mark Frost, either. The two would eventually go on to co-create Northwest Passage, one of the best regarded and most fondly remembered TV series of the early 1990s. As for Stephen King, pleased with the success of The Shining, his career entered its next, prolific phase - the 1980s.
Next Time on Blue Skies in Camelot: Checking in on Northern Ireland
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Author's Note: I was hoping to get this chapter published today, in honor of Stephen King's 76th birthday. ...
King is my personal favorite author, and a major inspiration to me as writer. I hope that you all won't mind my personal interest in the man and his work seeping into the world of Blue Skies in Camelot. Next update, we return to Northern Ireland, as I felt I already had a lot of material to cover on that topic. Then, it will be on to other foreign affairs. Cheers!