EXCLUSIVE: Netflix has made a deal to turn the Stephen King bestselling novel Cujo into a new feature film. Roy Lee is producing, and they will go out to writers immediately.
The novel was first turned into a 1983 thriller that starred Dee Wallace as a mother desperate to protect her son from a formerly friendly 200 pound St. Bernard that has been bitten by a rabid bat and turns into a ferocious, calculating hound that leaves a trail of bodies. Mom and her son get stuck in her small car that won’t start, and their choices are to battle it out with the rabid oversized hound or risk heatstroke in a hot car. The film was one of many adaptations of King’s thriller bestsellers that turned into film hits.
King continues to be as prolific as ever — Never Flinch will be next one published and he’s working on a third installment of The Talisman — but his backlist continues to be golden. The Osgood Perkins-directed adaptation of King’s short story The Monkey just came out, and upcoming are the Francis Lawrence-directed The Long Walk, the Edgar Wright-directed Glen Powell-starrer The Running Man, the It prequel Welcome to Derry with Andy Muschietti directing, the Jack Bender-directed The Institute, and a series adaption of Carrie with Mike Flanagan directing. Adaptations of more recent King novels include Fairy Tale with Paul Greengrass, and Life of Chuck with Flanagan.
King is repped by Rand Holston Management and Gang Tyre.