When Mike Flanagan announced that he was working on a film sequel to ‘The Shining’ that, in addition to adapting the novel ‘Doctor Sleep’ by Stephen King, would emulate the spirit of Stanley Kubrick in some of its passages, many of us raised an eyebrow and were tremendously skeptical -and it was no use signing that wonder entitled ‘The curse of Hill House’ when it comes to increasing optimism—.
Fortunately, the feature film starring Ewan McGregor ended up becoming a more than remarkable exercise that it even got better with a director’s cut that rounded it out to make it an almost essential experience for fans of the genre. ‘Doctor Sueño’ left us wanting more, but our desire will not be satisfied.
No news from Hallorann
In 2020, Flanagan confirmed to the ReelBlend podcast that he was working on a sequel to ‘Doctor Sleep’ that would begin development once filming was completed and that would focus on Hallorann, the character played by Scatman Crothers in Kubrick’s ‘The Shining’ and by Carl Lumbly in its sequel who served as Danny Lloyd’s mentor and protector. This is how he described the project.
“Hallorann was always more about a young Dick learning about the shining. And the ‘Doctor Sleep’ novel has a perfect prologue with the story of his grandparents, which he talks about a little bit in this film. But the idea was to start with him like Carl Lumbly and then find a way to travel back in time to tell this other story that would inevitably take us back to a familiar hotel as it did in ‘Doctor Sleep.'”
Sounds good, right? Well, sadly, as reported by the filmmaker himself on his Twitter account, this production has ended up falling on deaf ears. And the reason would be none other than the poor box office results from its predecessor, which grossed a disappointing $72 million worldwide on a budget of $45 million.
Because of DOCTOR SLEEP’s box office performance, Warner Bros opted not to proceed with it. They control the rights, so that was that.
— Mike Flanagan (@flanaganfilm) September 18, 2022
“Warner Bros. has chosen not to continue with it because of the box office performance of ‘Doctor Sleep’. They have the rights, so that was it.”
In other Tweet Regarding the same topic, Mike Flanagan affirms that will always regret that the feature film never got made. Us too, Mike. We also…