Stephen King has terrified readers for decades, but his work has also found its way onto the stage, where the audience sits close enough to feel the dread. Some of these productions were triumphs, some were famous flops and a few were genuine surprises. Here is a tour.
Misery
If any King story seemed built for the theater, it’s Misery. A bedridden novelist paired with his “number one fan” in a claustrophobic farmhouse seamlessly adapts to the stage.
The most high-profile version reached Broadway in late 2015 at the Broadhurst Theatre. Screenwriter William Goldman, who wrote the 1990 film adaptation, adapted his own script for the stage. The production drew attention for its casting: Bruce Willis made his Broadway debut as the captive writer Paul Sheldon, opposite Laurie Metcalf as Annie Wilkes. Metcalf earned acclaim and a Tony nomination for the role, and she did it while balancing menace with an unsettling warmth. The play also made a clever use of its set, with a rotating farmhouse that kept the audience just as trapped as Paul. Its lesson is that a story doesn’t need monsters when it has a really committed fan.
Jobsite Theater is currently presenting Misery in Straz Center’s Jaeb Theater, with performances through November 8. Learn more about the cast in this blog from earlier this month.
Carrie: The Musical
No King stage story is more famous, or more notorious, than Carrie: The Musical. It debuted in 1988, first in Stratford-upon-Avon and then on Broadway, with a score by Michael Gore and Dean Pitchford (the team behind Fame and Footloose) and a book by Lawrence D. Cohen, who wrote the original film script. Barbara Cook starred as the fanatical Margaret White.
The Broadway run lasted just a handful of performances after previews and became one of the most expensive flops in theater history. It was so infamous that a book about Broadway failures borrowed its name for the title, Not Since Carrie.
But the story doesn’t end there. The show developed a devoted cult following, and in 2012 MCC Theater staged a rewritten, leaner Off-Broadway revival. Critics were far kinder, and the show finally got some redemption. It’s proof that a bold swing can find its audience, even if it takes a couple of decades.
Ghost Brothers of Darkland County
For those seeking a gore-less King stage adaptation, look no further than Ghost Brothers of Darkland County, a Southern Gothic musical created with rock legend John Mellencamp. King wrote the book and lyrics, Mellencamp wrote the music and T Bone Burnett joined as music producer. The story follows two brothers navigating a family tragedy and ghosts who haven’t quite moved on.
The show premiered at the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta in 2012 and later toured. The album drew an impressive guest list, including Elvis Costello, Kris Kristofferson and Neko Case, and the whole project had a roots-music swagger that set it apart from a typical horror adaptation. Similar to other King works, the show leans heavily on themes of regret and dispair rather than slasher-esque jumpscares.
The Shining
Turn to the opera house, and The Shining might sound like an odd fit. But composer Paul Moravec and librettist Mark Campbell proved otherwise when Minnesota Opera premiered their adaptation in 2016. The opera production intentionally avoided copying Kubrick’s famous film, focusing closely on the novel’s tragic heart: a father unraveling and a family struggling to survive. The cast was led by baritone Brian Mulligan as Jack Torrance, and the score used the grand scale of opera to make the Overlook Hotel feel enormous and menacing. Opera is built for big emotions, and King’s characters have plenty of those.
Straz Center’s Opera Tampa took a crack at The Shining earlier this year, when it was presented in Ferguson Hall back in late January.
Dolores Claiborne
Another King work found its way to the opera stage with Dolores Claiborne, composed by Tobias Picker with a libretto by J.D. McClatchy. San Francisco Opera premiered it in 2013, with Patricia Racette in the title role. The story of a Maine housekeeper accused of murder is dramatic enough on the page, and the operatic treatment gave its themes of abuse, loyalty and survival considerable weight. This one was a reminder that King’s range stretches well beyond monsters.
Why King Works on Stage
What ties these productions together? King writes about people first and horror second, and that’s what theater does best. A stage can’t rely on special effects the way a film can, so it has to lean heavily on performance and imagination. Whether it’s a hostage drama in a farmhouse, a telekinetic teenager at prom or a haunted hotel set to music, the best King stage works put human emotion front and center.
They also show the range of the genre. King’s stories have been done as a thriller, a musical, a folk-rock ghost tale and two operas, which is a fair bit of versatility for a writer best known for paperbacks with scary covers.
Not every King adaptation has stuck the landing, and Carrie will forever be the cautionary tale. But the successes show how well his storytelling travels. As long as audiences enjoy a good scare, there will always be room for King on the stage.
