The 1152-page novel, first published in 1978 and then revised in 1990, is divided into three parts and begins with a pandemic that leads to the death of an estimated 99.4% of the world’s human population. The book chronicles the cross-country odysseys undertaken by survivors who are drawn to Boulder, Colo., and Las Vegas, where they end up fighting the Antichrist-like Randall Flagg.
Boone confirms he finished writing the script a month ago and that he thinks this is the first script ever "approved" by King himself. He confirms it will be a single, three-hour film that will stay "very close" to the novel (or maybe not?) .
"He [King] gives you so much great material to work with. There's an abundance of it. So it's not a book where you have to generate new material and make it work for a movie. He writes so cinematically and his characters are so sharply drawn. You don't have to change much. [You use] a lot of structural things to condense a thousand pages into a three-hour movie but it's still at heart his material. I just made it work within the confines of what a single film can be."
He adds that it will take at least six to eight months to prep the film thus production is not likely to begin until next Spring at the earliest. Meetings with actors and regarding budgets are ongoing.
Boone is the latest to hover around the project after the departure of "Crazy Heart" and "Out Of The Furnace" director Scott Cooper. Cooper vacated the job over "creative differences," after conning on to re-write "The Invasion" and "Blood Creek" scribe David Kajganich's draft--and direct the project earlier this year after Ben Affleck dropped out. Kajganich has also worked on the screenplay for the long thought of-feature film adaptation of King's It. David Yates and Steve Kloves, who worked on the Potter series together attached to the project. Paul Greengrass was even rumored in the mix at one point to put the story on film.
Boone told THR recently that he's writing a part specifically for "Stars" co-star Nat Wolff, making this the third project the duo will have worked on together following "Stars" and the upcoming film adaptation of author John Green's book "Paper Towns"
Jimmy Miller and Roy Lee are still slated to produce.
Boone was also asked about the film adaption of author Anne Rice best-selling novel series "The Vampire Chronicles" in development at Universal and Imagine Entertainment to which he is linked.
He says:
"I'm still in the process... Really I haven't even officially been hired yet. I'm still in the process of trying to get hired. I'm always surprised when those things leak online. But I love it and I want to do it. I'm just in the developmental stage where I'm still kicking the project around."
The studio's deal includes all eleven of the novels in Rice’s series: "Interview with the Vampire," "The Vampire Lestat," "The Queen of the Damned," The Tale of the Body Thief" "Memnoch the Devil," "The Vampire Armand," "Merrick," "Blood and Gold" "Blackwood Farm," "Blood Canticle" and this year's "Prince Lestat".
The books center around 18th century French nobleman Lestat de Lioncourt who becomes a vampire.
The character first seen on screen in Neil Jordan's 1994 adaptation of "Interview With the Vampire" starring Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and Kirsten Dunst. The second film was the much less well received "Queen of the Damned" in 2002 starring Stuart Townsend and singer Aaliyah who died shortly afterwards.
Rather than remake "Interview," the plan is to a adapt the second and third books - "Vampire Lestat" and "Damned". This version is also expected to be more faithful to the source material than the 2002 film. Rice's son, author Christopher Rice is writing the adapted screenplay for the film.
Alex Kurtzman Roberto Orci ("Transformers") and Brian Grazer will produce.
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