The Shining | |
---|---|
Also known as | Stephen King's The Shining |
Genre | Psychological horror Thriller Supernatural drama |
Based on | The Shining by Stephen King |
Written by | Stephen King |
Directed by | Mick Garris |
Starring | Rebecca De Mornay Steven Weber Wil Horneff Melvin Van Peebles Courtland Mead |
Music by | Nicholas Pike |
Country of origin | United States |
No. of episodes | 3 |
Production | |
Running time | 273 minutes |
Production companies | Lakeside Productions Warner Bros. Television |
Original release | |
Network | ABC |
Release | April 27 – May 1, 1997 |
The Shining (stylized as Stephen King's The Shining) is a 1997 three-episode horror television miniseries based on the 1977 Stephen King novel of the same name. Directed by Mick Garris from King's teleplay, it is the second adaptation of King's book after the 1980 film by Stanley Kubrick and was written and produced by King based on his dissatisfaction with Kubrick's version. The miniseries was shot at The Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado, King's inspiration for the novel, in March 1996.
The 1997 adaptation stars Steven Weber as Jack Torrance; Rebecca De Mornay as Jack's wife Wendy; Courtland Mead and Wil Horneff as different-aged versions of Danny Torrance; and Melvin Van Peebles as Dick Hallorann. Pat Hingle, Elliott Gould, John Durbin, Stanley Anderson, Lisa Thornhill, and Garris' wife Cynthia appear in supporting roles. Several notable writers and filmmakers working in the horror genre cameo in the miniseries' ballroom scene, and King himself appears as an orchestra conductor.
Originally airing from April 27 to May 1, 1997 on the American television network ABC, The Shining enjoyed a favorable reception when it first aired. It was a ratings hit, being in the top 20 of daily viewership numbers for all three episodes; acclaimed by critics for its careful pacing, makeup, depth, sound editing and creepy atmosphere; and won two Primetime Emmy and two Saturn Awards. However, retrospective critics have viewed the miniseries less fondly, declaring it boring and unfocused, and comparing it unfavorably to Kubrick's film version.
Jack Torrance's alcoholism and explosive temper have cost him his teaching job at Stovington, a respectable prep school. He is also on the verge of losing his family, after assaulting his young son Danny in a drunken rage just a year earlier. Horrified by what he has become, Jack tells his wife Wendy that should he ever start drinking again, he will leave them one way or another, implying that he would rather suicide than continue living as an alcoholic.
Now, nursing a life of sobriety and pulling in work as a writer, Jack takes on the job of looking after the Overlook Hotel, a large colonial building in a picturesque valley in the Colorado Rockies. Jack believes that the job will provide desperately needed funds and give him the time to complete his first play.
Upon entering the Overlook and meeting its head cook, Dick Hallorann, Danny discovers that his psychic powers grant him a form of telepathy. Danny has an adult mentor named Tony who talks to him in his visions and shows him the future. Hallorann tells Danny that he too "shines", and that Danny can contact him telepathically anytime he needs assistance. The Torrances are given a tour of the Overlook before being left alone in the hotel for the winter.
It gradually becomes evident that there is a malevolent force within the hotel that seems determined to use Danny for an unknown, possibly sinister purpose. This force manifests itself with flickering lamps and spectral voices and eventually a full-on masked ball from the Overlook's past. Danny is the first to fully notice the darker character of the hotel, having experienced visions and warnings that foreshadow what he and his parents will encounter over the winter.
The ghosts also appear to Jack, led by Delbert Grady, the Overlook's former steward who murdered his entire family and killed himself at the hotel's command. Grady and the other spirits tell Jack that Wendy and Danny are turning against him, and that his only option is to kill them. They also supply him with an open bar, and he begins drinking again. As Jack's sanity deteriorates, Wendy begins to fear for her and Danny's safety.
Hallorann, whom Danny had contacted telepathically, travels from Florida to Colorado, only to be assaulted by Jack with a roque mallet and left for dead. Danny telepathically communicates with his father, who momentarily breaks free of the ghosts' grip, and then tells him that the old boiler has been neglected. Danny, Wendy, and Hallorann (who had only been stunned by the attack) escape to safety. Jack sacrifices himself to prevent the ghosts from repossessing him and allows the boiler to explode and destroy the Overlook.
Ten years later, Danny graduates from high school, showing that Tony was Danny's adult incarnate self. Wendy and Halloran are present at the ceremony. Jack's spirit is also present, looking on Danny with pride. Back in Colorado, the Overlook is being rebuilt as a resort for the summer, as the ghosts of the original hotel await potential victims.
Several of Garris' colleagues who work in the horror genre cameo in the miniseries' ballroom scene, such as David J. Schow, Christa Faust, P. G. Sturges, Richard Christian Matheson, and Frank Darabont. [1] Stephen King appears as Gage Creed, the orchestra conductor, and Shawnee Smith cameos as a waitress. Sam Raimi also briefly appears as a gas station attendant. [1]
The creation of this miniseries is attributed to Stephen King's dissatisfaction with director Stanley Kubrick's 1980 film of the same name. [2] In order to receive Kubrick's approval to re-adapt The Shining into a program closer to the original story, King had to agree in writing to eschew his frequent public criticism of Kubrick's film, save for the sole commentary that he was disappointed with Jack Nicholson's portrayal of Jack Torrance as though he had been insane before his arrival at the Overlook Hotel. [3] [4] [5] ABC's success with previous miniseries adaptations of King's work made them more than willing to offer the author to work on the screenplay for The Shining miniseries with small Broadcast Standards and Practices enforced. [6]
The casting team had a very difficult time finding an actor for the role of Jack Torrance [7] as most of the considerations who rejected the role worried about being compared to Nicholson's performance in the Kubrick version. [8] Two of the many actors considered included Tim Daly (who had starred with Weber on the TV series Wings ) and Gary Sinise. [7] King got very impatient, threatening to "wait another 18 years" if the role for Jack Torrance wasn't booked. [9] Finally, via a suggestion from Rebecca De Mornay, Weber was chosen for the role [7] four days before filming began. [8] Weber accepted the offer because he was a fan of the Mick Garris-directed miniseries for The Stand and found the script he read to be "multi-layered" and relatable. [10] King was the one who chose De Mornay for the role of Wendy. [11] The producers approached her in 1994, and she accepted the role, enjoying the script for being "creepier, more disturbing, and more entertaining," and closer to the novel than the Kubrick version. [11]
Aside from the motive behind the creation of the miniseries, the 1997 rendition featured an important set piece that helped to inspire the original story: The Stanley Hotel in Estes Park, Colorado. King used the hotel that inspired him to write the book as the miniseries' location, with some interior shots in stages also in Denver. [8] Garris tried to make the hotel feel as "enclosed" as possible to add a vibe of claustrophobia when in a closed hotel; the crew did this by emphasizing the "darkness" of the hotel, [12] painting some of Stanley's areas that had recently been painted white, brown. [8]
The production team began shooting at the Stanley Hotel in March 1996, the date chosen as it was Denver's snowiest month. [8] However, on the day filming began, they realized the hotel as well as most of Estes Park was in a "snow shadow," meaning it garnered the least amount of snow out of all Denver areas. [8] As a result, they spent $100,000 in snowmaking machines sent from Los Angeles while lucking out on "three or four" shooting days with actual snow falling on Estes. [8] Producer Mark Carliner attributed the lucky snowfalls to a Ute shaman doing a ritual at the highest peak of the Rocky Mountains. [8] The cast and crew, such as Cynthia Garris, Mick Garris' wife who plays the woman in Room 217; and Dawn Jeffrey-Nelson, Courtland Mead's acting coach claimed paranormal experiences occurring at the hotel during shooting. [8]
Some of the cast enjoyed working on The Shining. Mead "wasn't scared" as he had acted previously in horror films like Hellraiser: Bloodline (1996); [10] John Durbin enjoyed the "madness" he got to portray with his character of Horace Derwent; [10] and Stanley Anderson, who accepted the part of Delbert Grady based on his disappointment with the Kubrick version, tried to play the character "real" but with "a sense of distance to [his] view of the other and the world, so it comes out as irony or wryness." [13] However, it was tough for Weber to play his character; because the scenes were not shot in chronological order, it was very difficult to master the character's mental state deterioration, due to it occurring gradually as the story progresses. [10]
Steve Johnson and his XFX team were responsible for the effects of The Shining. [13] When it came to the moving topiary animals, both live static and computer-animated versions of them were made. [13] For the more-than-80 dead extra characters in the ballroom, Bill Corso came up with the idea to add black marks on their cheeks and foreheads to make them look dead. [13] A special-effects-predominant ballroom sequence wasn't in the final version, where Gage Creed and his orchestra "run like tallow," in King's words. [13] Garris' reason was that it slowed down the miniseries' pacing and wasn't as "close[] to the real world" as the other scenes. [13] For the makeup of the woman in Room 217, thin shells of Saran Wrap were first glued on to certain areas of the actress' body via K-Y jelly. [13] Then, "some really milky-looking flesh tones" were added over the wrap and purple tones under it, before thin latex was covered over the entire body with certain areas ripped off. [14] Foam latex was also used to slightly alleviate how "creepy" the woman's make-up looked. [13] As Johnson explained what the effects team were going for with the dead lady, "the idea was to try to do something that was different, that would look cool, play in the scene and be allowed on TV." [13]
The first part of The Shining garnered 19.8 million viewers, ranking #12 for the week with a household rating of 12.5 and a market share of 19.[ citation needed ] The second part also ranked #12 for the week, with 18.3 million viewers, a 12.1 rating and a 20 share.[ citation needed ] The third part ranked #14 for the week, with 18.2 million viewers, an 11.9 rating and a 16 share.[ citation needed ]
The Shining opened to overwhelming praise from critics when it aired in 1997, [15] which included a ten-out-of-ten review from TV Guide . [16] The miniseries' "carefully" and "masterfully crafted" pacing was highlighted by several reviewers, [17] [18] including Ray Richmond of Variety , who also noted its "edge-of-your-seat creepiness" and "surprising emotional complexity and depth." [19] The depth and creepiness was also praised by Ken Tucker of Entertainment Weekly . [20] However, Tom Shales of The Washington Post advised his readers to "avoid [the miniseries] like the plague, because it is the plague." [21]
In more recent years, the miniseries critical reputation has cooled considerably with most finding it inferior compared to Kubrick's adaptation. The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported that 36% of critics have given the miniseries a positive review based on 11 reviews, with an average rating of 6.0/10. The site's critics consensus reads, "Stephen King's televisual adaptation of his own novel is more faithful than its cinematic counterpart, but unfortunately this miniseries is hobbled by a drab literalism of the text and cheesy effects that diminish the scares." [22] On Metacritic, it has a weighted average score of 61 out of 100 based on reviews from 14 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Drew Grant of The New York Observer , in 2014, ranked the miniseries as the worst made-for-TV King adaptation. [23]
Year | Award | Category | Nominee(s) | Result | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1997 | Artios Awards | Best Casting for TV Miniseries | Lynn Kressel | Nominated | [24] |
Online Film & Television Association Awards | Best Miniseries | Won | [25] | ||
Best Actor in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Steven Weber | Won | |||
Best Actress in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Rebecca De Mornay | Won [a] | |||
Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Courtland Mead | Nominated | |||
Melvin Van Peebles | Won | ||||
Best Direction of a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Mick Garris | Nominated | |||
Best Writing of a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Stephen King | Won | |||
Best Costume Design in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Nominated | ||||
Best Editing in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Won | ||||
Best Lighting in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Won | ||||
Best Makeup/Hairstyling in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Nominated | ||||
Best Music in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Nicholas Pike | Won | |||
Best New Theme Song in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Won | ||||
Best New Titles Sequence in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Won | ||||
Best Production Design in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Won | ||||
Best Sound in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Nominated | ||||
Best Visual Effects in a Motion Picture or Miniseries | Won | ||||
Primetime Emmy Awards | Outstanding Miniseries | Stephen King, Mark Carliner, and Elliot Friedgen | Nominated | [26] | |
Outstanding Makeup for a Miniseries or a Special | Bill Corso, Douglas Noe, Tracey Levy, Ve Neill, Barry R. Koper, Ashlee Petersen, Jill Rockow, Joe Colwell, Steve Johnson, and Joel Harlow | Won | |||
Outstanding Sound Editing for a Miniseries or a Special | Thomas DeGorter, Peter Bergren, Kenneth L. Johnson, Brian Thomas Nist, Joe Earle, Bradley C. Katona, Eric A. Norris, Andrew Ellerd, Linda Keim, Bruce Tanis, Ron Evans, Gary Lewis, Barbara Issak, Paul Longstaffe, James Hebenstreit, Stan Jones, Alyson Dee Moore, and Ginger Geary (for "Part 3") | Won | |||
1998 | American Cinema Editors Awards | Best Edited Episode from a Television Mini-Series | Patrick McMahon (for "Part 2") | Nominated | [27] |
Golden Reel Awards | Best Sound Editing – Television Mini-Series – Effects & Foley | Nominated | |||
Saturn Awards | Best Single Genre Television Presentation | Won | [28] | ||
Best Genre TV Actor | Steven Weber | Won | |||
Young Artist Awards | Best Performance in a TV Movie/Pilot/Mini-Series: Young Actor Age 10 or Under | Courtland Mead | Nominated | [29] |
The Shining is a 1977 horror novel by American author Stephen King. It is King's third published novel and first hardcover bestseller; its success firmly established King as a preeminent author in the horror genre. The setting and characters are influenced by King's personal experiences, including both his visit to The Stanley Hotel in 1974 and his struggle with alcoholism. The novel was adapted into a 1980 film and a 1997 miniseries. The book was followed by a sequel, Doctor Sleep, published in 2013, which in turn was adapted into a film of the same name in 2019.
Quicksilver Highway is a 1997 made for television comedy horror anthology film directed by Mick Garris. It is based on Clive Barker's 1985 short story "The Body Politic" and Stephen King's 1992 short story "Chattery Teeth". The film was originally shown on the Fox Network on 13 May 1997, before being released on home media.
The Stanley Hotel is a 140-room Colonial Revival hotel in Estes Park, Colorado, United States, about five miles from the entrance to Rocky Mountain National Park. It was built by Freelan Oscar Stanley, co-founder of the Stanley Motor Carriage Company, and opened on July 4, 1909, as a resort for upper-class Easterners and a health retreat for sufferers of pulmonary tuberculosis. The hotel and its surrounding structures are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Today, the hotel includes a restaurant, spa, and bed-and-breakfast; with panoramic views of Lake Estes, the Rockies, and Longs Peak.
Riding the Bullet is a 2004 horror film written, co-produced and directed by Mick Garris. It is an adaptation of Stephen King's 2000 novella of the same name. The film, which received a limited theatrical release, was not successful in theaters; it earned a domestic gross of $134,711.
The Shining is a 1980 psychological horror film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick and co-written with novelist Diane Johnson. It is based on Stephen King's 1977 novel of the same name and stars Jack Nicholson, Danny Lloyd, Shelley Duvall, and Scatman Crothers. The film presents the descent into insanity of a recovering alcoholic and aspiring novelist (Nicholson) who takes a job as winter caretaker for a haunted resort hotel with his wife (Duvall) and clairvoyant son (Lloyd).
"Autopsy Room Four" is a short story by American writer Stephen King. It was first published in King's limited-edition collection Six Stories in 1997 and appeared in the anthology Robert Bloch's Psychos later the same year. In 2002, it was collected in King's collection Everything's Eventual. It was adapted into a short film in 2003. It was also part of TNT's Nightmares & Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King series in the summer of 2006.
Daniel Edward Sidney Lloyd is an American former child actor best known for playing Danny Torrance in Stanley Kubrick's 1980 horror film The Shining. After appearing in the 1982 television film Will: G. Gordon Liddy, Lloyd retired from acting. He became a professor at the Elizabethtown Community and Technical College in 2004.
John Daniel Edward "Jack" Torrance is a fictional character and the main antagonist of Stephen King's horror novel The Shining (1977). He was portrayed by Jack Nicholson in the novel's 1980 film adaptation, by Steven Weber in the 1997 miniseries, by Brian Mulligan in the 2016 opera and by Henry Thomas in the 2019 film adaptation of Doctor Sleep. The American Film Institute rated the character the 25th-greatest film villain of all time. In 2008, Jack Torrance was selected by Empire magazine as one of the 100 greatest movie characters. Premiere magazine also ranked Torrance on their list of their 100 greatest movie characters of all time.
The Stand is a 1994 American post-apocalyptic television miniseries based on the 1978 novel of the same name by Stephen King. King also wrote the teleplay and has a minor role in the series. It was directed by Mick Garris, who previously directed the original King screenplay/film Sleepwalkers (1992).
Daniel Anthony Torrance, also known as Doctor Sleep, is a fictional character who first appears in the 1977 novel The Shining by Stephen King as a child with psychic powers called "the shining". His parents are father Jack Torrance and mother Wendy Torrance. The character was portrayed in the 1980 film adaptation The Shining by Danny Lloyd and by Courtland Mead in the 1997 television miniseries The Shining.
Doctor Sleep is a 2013 horror novel by American writer Stephen King and the sequel to his 1977 novel The Shining. The book reached the first position on The New York Times Best Seller list for print, ebook, and hardcover fiction. Doctor Sleep won the 2013 Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel.
Room 237 is a 2012 American documentary film directed by Rodney Ascher about interpretations of Stanley Kubrick's film The Shining (1980) which was adapted from the 1977 novel of the same name by Stephen King. The documentary includes footage from The Shining and other Kubrick films, along with discussions by Kubrick enthusiasts. Room 237 has nine segments, each focusing on a different element within The Shining which "may reveal hidden clues and hint at a bigger thematic oeuvre." Produced by Tim Kirk, the documentary's title refers to a room in the haunted Overlook Hotel featured in The Shining.
Stanley Film Festival was a horror film festival located in Estes Park, Colorado. Founded in 2013, the festival showcased independent horror films, including features, shorts and special events with guest filmmakers. The festival was named for the Stanley Hotel in Estes Park where it is held, a neo-Georgian hotel that was the inspiration and setting of Stephen King's horror novel The Shining. The festival also held a student film competition titled, The Stanley Dean's Cup.
Part of the New Hollywood era of cinema, Kubrick's films are considered by film historian Michel Ciment to be "among the most important contributions to world cinema in the twentieth century", and he is frequently cited as one of the greatest and most influential directors in the history of cinema. According to film historian and Kubrick scholar Robert Kolker, Kubrick's films were "more intellectually rigorous than the work of any other American filmmaker."
The Shining is an American opera in two acts and an epilogue, with music by composer Paul Moravec and a libretto by Mark Campbell, based on the 1977 novel by Stephen King. The opera received its world premiere on May 7, 2016 at the Ordway Music Theater, Saint Paul, Minnesota. It is part of the "New Works Initiative" of Minnesota Opera.
Doctor Sleep is a 2019 American supernatural horror film written, directed, and edited by Mike Flanagan. It is an adaptation of the 2013 novel of the same name by Stephen King and sequel to Stanley Kubrick's 1980 film The Shining. The film stars Ewan McGregor as Dan Torrance, a man with psychic abilities and a drinking problem, who struggles with childhood trauma caused by the horrors at the Overlook Hotel. Rebecca Ferguson, Kyliegh Curran, and Cliff Curtis have supporting roles as new characters: Abra Stone and Billy Freeman team up with Dan to take down Rose the Hat and her gang of followers.
"Midnight, the Stars and You" is a British-American popular foxtrot song written by Harry M. Woods, Jimmy Campbell and Reg Connelly and published in 1934.
Richard Hallorann is a fictional character created by Stephen King from his 1977 novel The Shining. He has telepathic abilities he called "the shining" and is the head chef at the Overlook Hotel. He meets Danny Torrance, a young boy who is also telepathic, and learns that the evil spirits of the hotel have taken control of Danny's father, Jack.
Winnifred "Wendy" Torrance is a fictional character and protagonist of the 1977 horror novel The Shining by the American writer Stephen King. She also appears in the prologue of Doctor Sleep, a 2013 sequel to The Shining.
The Shining is an American supernatural horror media franchise that originated from the 1977 novel of the same name by Stephen King. The novel was later adapted into a 1980 film and a 1997 television miniseries. King later wrote a 2013 sequel novel, Doctor Sleep, which was adapted to film in 2019.