John Lee Hancock’s adaptation of Stephen King’s Mr. Harrigan’s Phone hit Netflix earlier this week and, to celebrate its arrival, the streaming giant has a fun little interview with the Master of Horror about how the film came together, King’s favorite King movies, and what his writing process is like these days. It’s an enjoyable read, but then – right at the very end – King says something we really didn’t expect him to say.
Here’s the exchange:
Netflix: You’ve written screenplays, acted and even directed, with Maximum Overdrive. If you had to choose one of those to do again, which would it be?
King: I’d like to do them all. I’d love to direct another picture because Maximum Overdrive was like, “Earn while you learn.” I knew nothing going in, and I learned a lot of stuff since then, and I think I could probably do a better job. As far as writing the screenplay, sure, I’d love to do that. And acting? I’m not very good at it, but…
That’s right: over 35 years after directing Maximum Overdrive, King now says he’d love to direct another film. This is surprising for a number of reasons! For one thing, Maximum Overdrive was (somewhat infamously) a very troubled production, and the resulting film didn’t exactly set the box office on fire. Years later, it’s a beloved cult film amongst a certain section of King’s fanbase, but it’s taken quite a while to find itself in that position.
Perhaps, in the intervening years, King has decided he’d like another at-bat. Maybe, after visiting an untold number of movie sets over the past few decades and observing other filmmakers as they adapt his work, he simply feels the itch to give it another go, to not go out on the one-and-done of Maximum Overdrive. Whatever the case may be, we’d certainly be interested to see him take another swing at it! One cannot help but wonder what a Stephen King movie in the 2020’s would even look like.
Will it happen? Oh, who knows. Stranger things have certainly occurred, and it’s undoubtedly fun to imagine such a project coming together. Guess we’ll just have to wait and see! In the meantime: consider revisiting Maximum Overdrive, why don’tcha? If you go in with the understanding that it’s King in EC Comics mode (close to Creepshow vibes but not quite), it’s a helluva lot of fun.
