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Stephen King slams proposed Shining prequel - SciFiNow

Stephen King slams proposed Shining prequel

“I would be happy if it didn’t happen,” says Stephen King of Warner Bros’ Shining prequel

Jack Nicholson as Jack Torrence in The Shining

Warner Bros previously announced their plans to produce a prequel to Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 snowbound classic The Shining, based on the unpublished prologue ‘Before The Play’ depicting earlier events at the Overlook Hotel, as well as the traumatic, abused childhood of Jack Torrence, memorably depicted in Kubrick’s masterpiece by Jack Nicholson.

Original author Stephen king, however isn’t so keen, despite the fact he’s currently working on a sequel to the 1977 Shining novel entitled Doctor Sleep.

“There’s a real question about whether or not they have the rights to ‘Before The Play’,” said King, talking to Entertainment Weekly, “which was the prologue cut from the book — because the epilogue to the book was called ‘After the Play.’ So they were bookends, and there was really scary stuff in that prologue that wouldn’t make a bad movie.

“Am I eager to see that happen? No I am not. And there’s some real question about what rights Warner Bros does still have. The Shining is such an old book now that the copyright comes back to me. Arguably, the film rights lapse — so we’ll see.

“We’re looking into that. I’m not saying I would put a stop to the project, because I’m sort of a nice guy. When I was a kid, my mother said, ‘Stephen if you were a girl, you’d always be pregnant.’ I have a tendency to let people develop things. I’m always curious to see what will happen. But you know what? I would be just as happy if it didn’t happen.”

Pick up The Shining on Blu-ray for £7.25 or 2 disc special edition DVD for £13.99 from Amazon.co.uk.