In recent years we've become accustomed to novels being adapted into multiple films, with the final volumes in the Harry Potter, Twilight and Hunger Games sagas all being split into two parts each. Then there's The Hobbit precedent, of course, where a shortish book was expanded to a nine-hour trilogy. Now, unsurprisingly, director Josh Boone (Stuck In Love, The Fault In Our Stars) has revealed the plan for adapting Stephen King's colossal The Stand: it will be divided into four movies.
Assuming lengthier running times than 90 minutes each, that means Warner Bros.' franchise will actually be longer than the Mick Garris' ABC TV miniseries from 1994. "We're going to do four," Boone told Kevin Smith, "and we're going to do The Stand at the highest level you can do it at, with a cast that's going to blow people's minds. We've already been talking to lots of people, and have people on board in certain roles that people don't know about...". Casting rumours to date have included unspecified roles for Matthew McConaughey and Nat Wolff.
Set after an American super-flu virus has wiped out most of the world's population, The Stand sees a King-typical band of mismatched survivors trying to establish a peacenik new society under the aegis of Earth-mother Abigail Freemantle. The existence of another group however, led by King's recurring antichrist Randall Flagg, means conflict - the stand of the title - is brewing.
First published in 1978, The Stand was always epic in size and scope, but was re-issued in 1990 in an "author's cut" that was even longer. The immense challenge of writing the adaptation has, in this current development cycle, passed through the hands of Steve Kloves and David Kajganich, with Boone finally coming up with his own draft. He hopes to start shooting in the first half of next year.