Adapting the King of horror

AN adaptation of Stephen King’s Misery will be brought to the stage in Glór on November 30 and December 1.

The prolific American novelist has a huge global following for his dark fiction and many of his novels, including Misery, have been adapted as films.

Misery is probably better known as a movie at this stage, having been released in 1990 to very warm reviews, with Kathy Bates winning an Oscar for her role in it.

The plot centres around Paul Sheldon, a celebrated novelist who survives a serious car crash shortly after finishing his latest book.

However when his self-professed ‘number one’ fan Annie Wilkes takes him home to recover, he is far from out of danger.

A famous scene in which Bates wielded a sledgehammer helped make the movie particularly memorable.

This adaptation is by Simon Moore and features well-known Waterford actor Denise Quinn as Wilkes, while Joe Meagher takes on the role of Sheldon.

Director John Grubb says he has been struck by the amount of Stephen King fans who’ve been coming to see the play.

“What we’ve been really surprised with is the response to it. It’s a genre that we took on and were very unsure about. I never knew the amount of Stephen King fans out there. We tend not to sell it to theatre audiences, for example we found one contact in a book club in Waterford and that nearly took up a night for us. It’s that strong.”

He feels King has exerted a very strong influence on contemporary Irish writing and while his work doesn’t win many literary awards, he says his respect for King has grown.

“I wasn’t [a fan] before actually, more now. I’m after losing a bit of my snobbery towards him! I think that without a doubt, if you look at popular Irish writers like Martin McDonagh, they have Stephen King to thank.

“If you look at the Leenane Trilogy or the Pillow Man, Stephen King came up with that style for stories like this. I think it’s very relevant.

“This is set in a fictional town in the middle of nowhere in America, very similar to Leenane and it’s about how claustrophobic these places are.”

There’s one question that everyone asks about the stage adaptation. “Everyone asks us about the legs, ‘do they break the legs, do they break the legs’, that’s all I’ve heard. I think a lot of movie fans are coming as well.”

The production company Suirfire were only founded after the recession got into full swing, which influences the type of work they do.

“We’re going for nearly two years now. Because we’re not funded by the Arts Council we’ve been kind of doing commercial works to fund ourselves. This is definitely our flagship production.”
He feels it is important that theatre continues to divert.

“There’s such doom and gloom out there. I’ve worked in theatre since I was very young and I think we kind of have a responsibility to produce now, as entertainers. It should be our time to shine when the public are down and gloomy, we should go and earn our spurs.”

The show was reviewed positively by The Sunday Times, “Both actors deliver in different roles: Quinn extracts winces and shudders from the audience with unnerving ease. Directed by John Grubb with impressive set and lighting designs, Misery is as good a warning against drink-driving as they come.”