You don’t have to look far back in time to discover evidence that a Stephen King novel has been uncomfortably squeezed into a standard feature film. As I noticed in my review of CinemaBlend, Gary Dauberman Salem Plot handles King’s story and characters effectively, but suffers from a lack of scope in the source material. It often happened that miniseries fit much better into the author’s extensive narrative – that’s why I was happy to learn about the latest news about the adaptation Fairy tale: Initially developed as a film, it is now moving to the small screen.
This is just the main story of this week’s issue King Beata – which is so swamped with news that I don’t have space to cover it fully a surprisingly funny trailer for an Osgood Perkins movie Monkey it fell on Tuesday. Apart from the news about Fairy talecasting updates are available for both Edgar Wright remake Running Man AND MGM+ Instituteand we already know when we will be able to read the upcoming anthology with stories set in the world Stand. There’s a lot to cover, so let’s dig into the details!
(Photo: A24)
A24 is getting into the Stephen King game by developing the fairy tale as a TV series
Adapting Stephen King’s novel took virtually no time Fairy tale enter into development. The novel appeared in stores in September 2022, and the news spread less than a month later writer/director Paul Greengrass is developing it as a feature film. Little has been reported on its progress since then, but that changed dramatically this week as the project pivoted to become a 10-episode miniseries.
According to Deadline, Fairy tale has changed studios, but Paul Greengrass still plays a key creative role. According to the industry, it was deemed “impossible” to include the source material in a feature film and Universal abandoned the project (it initially acquired the project in a so-called “hot auction”). A24 is now backing the miniseries – the studio’s first Stephen King-related project – and Greengrass is working with Bangs AND Almost human screenwriter JH Wyman will expand the Greengrass script (Wyman will take over as showrunner).
There is an expectation that Objective concession/Captain Phillips the filmmaker will take part in the creation Fairy tale as director, but the deals are reportedly yet to be finalized.
The fantasy novel tells the story of Charlie Reade, a teenager living in Illinois, who one day while walking saves the life of his elderly neighbor when he hears a dog barking. He ends up caring for the pet while an elderly man, Howard Bowditch, is in the hospital, and after he is discharged from the hospital, he becomes Howard’s caregiver. As they spend time together, Charlie begins to make strange discoveries about his grumpy new friend, which ultimately leads him to discover a fantastical alternate world.
As much as I love watching new Stephen King movies on the big screen, I really like the fact that there’s this middling change because it’s clearly what’s best for the source material. A big part of what’s great about this novel is the genre shift that only happens once you get it. Before becoming a full fantasy story, it begins as a coming-of-age story about a boy struggling with the higher powers of the universe after he prays for his widowed father to stop drinking. This character development and the creation of a bond between Charlie, Howard, and Howard’s dog, Radar, is essential, and one can imagine it being cut and hollowed out as a 30-minute first act of a film that puts much greater focus on the alternate universe the hero discovers.
With five times the narrative space provided by the miniseries medium, Fairy tale can treat this part of the story with the attention it deserves before giving viewers a fantastic adventure filled with wild oddities, magic, and evil monsters.
As a side note, I’m also thrilled that A24 – one of the most respected independent studios today – is getting into the Stephen King game. This news comes in the same year that Neon became attached to the duo King’s upcoming films (mentioned Monkey and Mike Flanagan Chuck’s life), and with the genre’s established reputation, it’s exciting to see distribution diversifying beyond the main studios and streamers.
The only bad news is that the trade report doesn’t mention speed Fairy taledevelopment and when production may be scheduled to begin – but as new information about the project becomes available, you can be sure to find updates here on CinemaBlend.
(Photo: A24)
Both The Running Man and The Institute have expanded their casts
Two more Stephen King adaptations are scheduled to begin filming before the end of 2024, and the two have been actively building their cast in recent weeks. As for the movie, we have the Edgar Wright remake Running Manand on Team Small Screen there is an upcoming series based on Institute. Both teams have grown in size over the past few days.
According to a report by DeadlineKarl Glusman became the latest actor to join the cast of the film Running Manwhich aims to get much closer to its dystopian sci-fi source material 1987 action film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. Glusman’s standout credits include two collaborations with writer-director Alex Garland (TV series Creators and 2024 Civil war), and most recently starred alongside Austin Butler, Jodie Comer and Tom Hardy in Jeff Nichols’ film Cyclists. Unfortunately, we don’t know what role he will play in Edgar Wright’s new film, which already stars Glen Powell, Katy O’Brian and Daniel Ezra.
Running Man is produced by Paramount Pictures and will hit theaters on November 21, 2025.
Unfortunately, we don’t know exactly when MGM+ plans to start broadcasting the debut episodes Institutebut the growing series has rounded out its cast with three new additions. The series, created by director/executive producer Jack Bender and writer/executive producer Benjamin Cavell, will be based on Stephen King’s 2019 novel, and the casting department has been busy in recent months. This was first reported in June Mary Louise-Parker and Ben Barnes will play key rolesand since then the team has been constantly developing.
This week it was revealed that the series will have eight episodes added Brendan Beiser as a regular and Mary Walsh and Jordan Alexander in recurring roles. All three will play characters that exist outside the titular Institute – a facility that houses and conducts experiments on kidnapped children who are believed to have telekinetic or telepathic abilities. Young actor Joe Freeman landed the role of main character Luke Ellis and, as previously reported on The King Beat, he was joined on the series by Fionn Laird (Under the Banner of Heaven), Hannah Galway (Under the Banner of Heaven), Julian Richings (Beau is afraid), Robert Joy (Julia), Viggo Hanvelt (Our Christmas mural), Arlena So (Something rotten), Birva Pandya (Umbrella Academy), Dan Beirne (Ginny and Georgia), Martin Roach (Suits) and Jane Luk (Streams flow from the river).
Filming Institute will begin in Nova Scotia before the end of the year.
(Photo: CBS Television Distribution)
The End of the World as We Know It: Stephen King’s New Stories on the Stand is now available for pre-order
Last year around this time, there were regular readers all over the world I first learned about a very cool Stephen King-related literary project we were working on. With King’s approval and support, writer/editors Brian Keene and Christopher Golden worked hard to create this book The End of the World as We Know It: Stephen King’s Tales of the Stand – which, as the title suggests, is an anthology of short stories set in the world Stand. Since then, several details about the project have leaked (e.g. the fact that will feature stories set outside the United States), but we received perhaps the most important pre-release news this week: the release date.
The collection of short stories, which will include an introduction written by Stephen King, will be published by Simon & Schuster and will be available in stores on August 19, 2025. Both hardcover and electronic versions are now available for pre-order from outlets including: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Books-a-million AND Księgarnia.org.
Full list of co-authors The End of the World as We Know It: Stephen King’s Tales of the Stand has not yet been revealed, but it includes many talented and popular writers, including Paul Tremblay, Josh Malerman, Richard Chizmar, Bev Vincent, SA Cosby, Tananarive Due, Robert Cargill, Alex Segura and Wayne Brady.
That concludes this week’s edition of The King Beat, but I’ll be back next Thursday on CinemaBlend with the latest news from the world of Stephen King.