In Hollywood, every project moves at its own pace. Enough excitement and resources for an idea can get some movies through pre-production and principal photography in a matter of months, while others may take a decade to get up on their feet. You can never quite be sure which way things are going to go.
Let’s take a pair of recently announced Stephen King projects as an example. It was only back in February that Paramount+’s upcoming Pet Sematary follow-up was announced as being in development, and now production is being planned for August. Conversely, while a new remake of Christine was revealed to be in the works earlier this month, producer Jason Blum has confirmed that it’s going to be a minute before that particular project starts really gunning its engine.
I had the pleasure of interviewing Jason Blum this week during the virtual press day for The Forever Purge, and I used part of the time during our conversation to discuss the Stephen King adaptations that Blumhouse Productions currently has in the works. He noted that Keith Thomas’ Firestarter, starring Zac Efron, is coming along nicely and has earned King’s seal of approval – but as for Christine, plans for that film are still very much in the early stages:
Yeah. [John Carpenter’s Christine] is quite different than the book, and that's in a much earlier stage, so we don't have a script or anything for that. We're still talking about ideas. So there's not really much to say about that. We're a long way from shooting, and hopefully we'll get there, but we've got a long way to go on that one.
For those who missed the news, it was reported earlier this month that Blumhouse and Sony Pictures are collaborating on a new big screen adaptation of Stephen King’s classic killer car novel Christine, and Bryan Fuller (Hannibal, Pushing Daisies) is attached to write and direct. It was said in the trades that the project will still be a period piece, but clearly there is little about the film that is presently set in stone.
The 1983 novel tells the story of Arnie Cunningham, a nerdy loser who starts to undergo massive changes when he purchases a trashed 1958 Plymouth Fury. Arnie dedicates himself to restoring the secretly evil car back to its former glory, but doing so slowly begins to corrupt him – leaving his best friend and girlfriend to try and save him before it is too late.
Christine is one of three Stephen King adaptations that Blumhouse Productions currently has in the works – the studio having previously made 2014’s Mercy (based on the short story “Gramma” from Night Shift). The aforementioned Firestarter is currently in production, and Jason Blum is also teaming up with Ryan Murphy to produce a feature version of “Mr. Harrigan’s Phone” from If It Bleeds for Netflix.
So, fellow Constant Readers, we’ll have to be a bit patient when it comes to the wait for Bryan Fuller’s Christine – but hopefully all that time will be well spent making sure that the movie is the best version of itself possible.
