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Nov 8, 2019 · November 8, 2019. 5 min read. Mike Flanagan ’s “Doctor Sleep” connects the visions of Stephen King and Stanley Kubrick with his own style, made most popular in Netflix’s “The Haunting of Hill House.”
Nov 8, 2019 · Mike Flanagan's new Stephen King adaption, starring Ian McEwan, is satisfyingly chock-full of dread—and bogged down by too many nods to The Shining.
- K. Austin Collins
Sep 6, 2024 · As the filmmaker continues to bring the author's works to life, Mike Flanagan looks back on Stephen King's glowing review of his Doctor Sleep movie. The 2019 movie served as an adaptation of both of King's Shining novels and a sequel to Stanley Kubrick's 1980 movie, exploring an adult Danny Torrance as he must step up to protect a young girl ...
- Grant Hermanns
- "You can't out-Kubrick Kubrick," says director Mike Flanagan.
- Doctor Sleep Images
- Doctor Sleep vs. The Shining: Side-By-Side Comparison
- IGN Recommends
By Meg Downey
Updated: Sep 5, 2019 9:03 pm
Posted: Sep 5, 2019 4:00 pm
It would be difficult to accurately describe the way it felt to turn the corner of an otherwise nondescript backlot building in Atlanta, Georgia and suddenly find myself standing in the Colorado Lounge of the Overlook Hotel. It would have almost felt like trespassing -- like gawking at something we were never meant to see -- had director Mike Flanagan not been there, beaming ear-to-ear as he ushered invited press into the heart of his latest project: Doctor Sleep, a successor to The Shining, based on the Stephen King novel of the same name.
Doctor Sleep was always destined to be a complicated thing, considering the legacy that surrounds its predecessor, but the looming shadow of both Kubrick and King is not something Flanagan had any interest in trying to dodge or duck around. Instead, he welcomed the challenge -- even though the idea was "scarier in practice than it was in concept."
It's impossible not to feel Flanagan's enthusiasm--and similarly, his reverence--for the story when speaking with him. As he lead us through through the Colorado Lounge set, he'd pause, point out the tiniest details--photos on the wall, patterning on pillows, even the number of books on shelves --and cite frames from the Kubrick original. He and his production designers went to every length possible to create a faithful recreation of the iconic location--and their attention to detail didn't stop there. As we gathered to speak at length about the filming process, we were ushered into their recreation of (a much older, much more worse-for-wear) Room 237, where Flanagan took the time to answer questions.
Despite his reservations, Flanagan was quick to devour Doctor Sleep as a novel and was surprised by what he managed to uncover. "What I loved the most about it was that the difference in King as a storyteller from when he wrote The Shining, aware of his own alcoholism and writing that as an expression of the fear of what that could do to his own family. As he's gotten older, and was sober, looking at The Shining being about addiction and Doctor Sleep being about recovery. And that to me felt so perfect in that that was a journey that Jack as a character could not take. And so it was up to Dan to pick that mantle up and succeed where his father failed."
To embody that journey, Flanagan and King mutually decided on Ewan McGregor to play the part of grown-up Danny Torrence.
"It all came down to a gut feeling towards the end, that we all shared in the room, it just felt like this was Ewan's part. So we sent that recommendation to King, who I thought would have an awful lot to say," Flanagan explained. "[King] was very involved in all the casting decisions, and this part is so close to his heart. [...] But he came back very enthusiastic about Ewan, and it's really neat. I think Ewan brings an endearing quality to him, and he's built decades of goodwill with viewers, but he can tip himself just over the edge where you start to feel this danger, and you start to see that darkness that he can tap into for something like this. It's been really fascinating watching him straddle that line throughout production. It's a very interesting take on the character."
McGreggor, who stopped by to chat briefly between filming scenes, explained that his relationship to both The Shining and Doctor Sleep was much, much different from Flanagan's. "I remember it being, you know, just being talked about as being the scariest film that there's ever been. And so I didn't watch it until I was, I mean, you know, years and years after it was made. So probably into my late teens or maybe even when I went to drama school in my twenties," he laughed. "[And] funnily enough, [I read] Doctor Sleep first because I read [it] when I got this part. I haven't completed The Shining yet. I'm sort of dipping into as we go along."
Strangely, both McGreggor's and Curran's relative nonchalance regarding The Shining as a cultural monolith actually provided a perfect counterpoint to Flanagan's enthusiasm, rather than an undercurrent. The feeling on set never tipped over the edge into "fanservice" territory, despite the risks, and never felt like a pastiche of Kubrick or King.
"You can't out-Kubrick Kubrick," Flanagan admitted easily, so he doesn't have the mind to try. Instead, his mission -- and the mission of the cast -- is to tell a new story worthy of a decades-old legacy. One that will, with any luck, be simultaneously as reverent to the classic as Kubrick and King fans like Flanagan himself is, while ultimately carving a new path all its own -- one that doesn't just evoke the past but engages it in a much-needed conversation.
And now, as the new caretaker of the Overlook, he’s responsible with adapting Doctor Sleep for the masses. Flanagan takes on the monumental expedition of reconciling Kubrick’s mind-blowing dark...
Oct 30, 2019 · Perfectly melding the works of Kubrick and King, Doctor Sleep is a totally different kind of story than The Shining, but operates as a wonderful expansion of that world seen through the eyes an...
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Oct 31, 2019 · The new film, adapted by writer-director Mike Flanagan from King’s own novel, is an adventure that spans the US and covers almost 40 years. It doesn’t have Kubrick’s masterly control of ...
