The shining could have been a trilogy like the sequel Doctor Sleep hadn’t bombed theaters. Written and directed by Mike Flanagan, Doctor Sleep was released in 2019. Based on a story by Stephen King, the film served as a sequel to The shining, starring Ewan McGregor as an adult Danny Torrance decades after the events of the original film. Reviews were mostly positive, but the film flopped in theaters and fell far short of what Warner Bros. directors said. had hoped for.
In 2020 Flanagan, per CinemaBlendthat he had plans to appears prequel immediately after the release of Doctor Sleep. The idea would have been to focus on the backstory of Dick Hallorann, the late chef of the Overlook Hotel played by Carl Lumbly in Doctor Sleep and Scatman Crothers in the original movie.
“Hallorann was always more about Dick as a younger man learning about the shine. And the Doctor Sleep novel makes a perfect prologue to the story of his grandmother and grandfather,” Flanagan said of the story’s potential. “But the idea was to start with him as Carl Lumbly, and then find a way to go back to the past and telling this kind of other story that would inevitably, very much get in the way Doctor Sleep did, inevitably brought us back to a familiar hotel. But I do not know. I don’t know what we would do with it. I love it though. And it was something we were really excited about.”
Now Flanagan expresses his regret that the film did not go ahead. On Twitter, he responded to fan-created artwork from Readful Things of a concept poster for a Dick Hallorann film. Flanagan responded to the poster, tweeting, “We were SO CLOSE. I will always regret that this didn’t happen.
When a fan asked him to clarify why the film didn’t come to fruition, Flanagan added in a follow-up tweet: “Due to the box office performance of DOCTOR SLEEP, Warner Bros has chosen not to go through with it. They control it.” the rights, so that was that.”
An Overlook Hotel series was also cancelled
Meanwhile, the Doctor Sleep follow up focused on Dick Hallorann wasn’t the only one appears-based project to get nixed. There had been reports of a spin-off series set in the world of The shining developing at HBO Max. dubbed Surveythe series would also have been a prequel, focusing on the hotel in the years before The shining. It has since been reported that the series was canceled before production could begin.
As for Mike Flanagan, he is currently working on the Edgar Allan Poe inspired series The Fall of the House of Usher for Netflix following previous collaborations with the streamer, including: The Haunting of Hill House, Chasing Bly Manorand Midnight Mass. His latest series for Netflix, The Midnight Clubwill premiere on October 7.