I’m slowly working my way through all of Stephen King’s novels in chronological order. One of the big reasons I’m doing that is because I’ve never delved into the depths of his magnum opus,The Dark Tower. I’ve read the first book and the short story, “The Little Sisters of Eluria”, but I feel like I want to experience as much of King’s universe as I can before I tackle his masterwork (in terms of length, possibly not quality). Hopefully, that will be before Columbia Pctures’ film adaptation gets off the ground.
Today’s news should make some fans of the books happy. Matthew McConaughey has met with director Nikolaj Arcel to discuss the possibility of starring as the Man in Black a.k.a. Randall Flagg, one of the story’s main antagonists. This seems like perfect casting, but not because of my familiarity with Flagg in The Dark Tower. I know him from King’s original Lord of the Rings-esque epic, The Stand. That film adaptation is over at Warner Bros., which begs the question: if McConaughey is cast as Flagg in The Dark Tower, will a different Flagg show up in The Stand? This seems like a moment where WB and Columbia (a Sony-owned company) might want to follow Sony’s lead a la Spider-Man and share the character because I want McConaughey as Flagg in The Stand. That must happen. It probably won’t, but it must.
Regardless, this has to be good news for fans of King and McConaughey. If you’ve seen Killer Joe then you know he can play a delicious twisted villain. We’ll keep our eye on this one.
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