RW363 - The Shining Rewatch - Doctor Sleep

                               

In this episode of The Shining Rewatch, Cory and Nathan get a bit steamy as they discuss "Doctor Sleep."

Trailer:

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Stephen King first got the idea for Doctor Sleep in 1998 at a book signing when somebody asked him what happened to Danny Torrance from his novel 'The Shining'. This was a question King had often asked himself, as well as what would have happened to Jack Torrance had he found AA (Alcoholics Anonymous). When people kept repeating the question, King always jokingly replied that Danny eventually married Charlene McGee, the girl from Firestarter (1984). However, King eventually started thinking seriously about how old Danny was and what happened to Wendy and decided to find the answers with a sequel, but it was a tall order.

It took a lot of negotiating to get this film made. Mike Flanagan had to convince Stephen King that, despite his own distaste for Stanley Kubrick's The Shining (1980), audiences were more familiar with that version rather than The Shining (1997), and largely preferred the film to the miniseries. Therefore, this film had to be a sequel to Stanley Kubrick's classic film.

While the film Doctor Sleep is intended to be a direct adaptation of the 2013 sequel novel, director Mike Flanagan said Doctor Sleep still "acknowledges Kubrick's The Shining in some way". Flanagan said, "It is an adaptation of the novel Doctor Sleep, which is Stephen King's sequel to his novel, The Shining. But this also exists very much in the same cinematic universe that Kubrick established in his adaptation of The Shining." He explained working with all the sources, "Reconciling those three, at times very different, sources has been kind of the most challenging and thrilling part of this creatively for us." He first read the novel, and then had a conversation with King to work out adapting all the sources. As part of the process, Flanagan recreated scenes from The Shining to use in flashbacks. Same as The Shining, Flanagan also avoided the horror film trope of jump scares.

On why he wanted to present the film as a continuation of Kubrick's film, Flanagan expressed, "The Shining is so ubiquitous and has burned itself into the collective imagination of people who love cinema in a way that so few movies have.â€

In the novel, it is revealed that Dan Torrance is actually Abra's uncle, Jack Torrance once had an affair with her grandmother.

Most elements from The Shining (1980) were recreated with duplicate sets and lookalike actors, though three shots were reused: the aerial shot of the water and the island and the two shots after it of the car driving on the mountain road. The shots were degrained, recolored as day-for-night, and had snow digitally added.

Mike Flanagan painstakingly recreated the sets of the Overlook hotel from blueprints acquired from Stanley Kubrick's estate.

Dr. John Dalton's (Bruce Greenwood) room, in which Danny is interviewed for the orderly position, is identical to Stuart Ullman's office where Jack Torrance was interviewed in for the caretaker job in The Shining (1980) (1980), right down to the paint color and the little American flag on the right side of the desk.

The poster for "Joe Collins Live" outside the movie theater when Andi is leaving references a character from The Dark Tower book series. Joe Collins, a.k.a. Dandelo, is a creature like the True Knot - an emotional vampire - but feeds on laughter instead of fear.

Actor Henry Thomas had to shave his head and wear a wig to match the hairline of Jack Torrance from The Shining.

Jack Torrance technically returns for the sequel, as the ghostly bartender that meets Danny Torrance. He is now played by Henry Thomas, who was cast for his resemblance to a young Jack Nicholson. Mike Flanagan admitted that he would have loved nothing more than to get Jack Nicholson to reprise his role, but ultimately thought it best not to, for several understandable reasons. Jack Nicholson has already retired as an actor, and he feels he wouldn't have been able to commit to the role like he did back in 1980, not to mention his memory has deteriorated quite a bit and he would have issues remembering his lines, and he wouldn't want to be a nuisance to the cast and crew. Even if he agreed, his presence alone would have caused the film to go over budget, and that's not even including the extensive CGI effects that would be required to digitally de-age him to make him look like he did back in 1980.

According to director Mike Flanagan, the performance of Jacob Tremblay during the first take of his death scene was so intense that it surprised and scared the other actors, including Rebecca Ferguson, who was so horrified she was stammering and "couldn't get her lines out". When the scene was over, a grinning Tremblay jumped up, covered in fake blood, high-fived his father and walked over to the craft service to get a snack, leaving Ferguson and the rest of the cast "shell-shocked and traumatized"

Crow Daddy's pistol holster is a Union Army Cavalry officer's for Colt Model 1860 revolver. This is a reference to the novel, when it is hinted Crow Daddy was originally a tracker for the Army during the American Civil War.

Many of Rose's accessories are trinkets from various children Rose has killed, including bracelets, hair bands, toys, and even a bicycle chain (woven into her hair). Ferguson wanted to wear "trophies" of her victims, hidden in plain sight.

While the climax of the film does differ from the novel, it closely adapts the original events from King's source material of The Shining, centered around the final events at the Overlook Hotel (but with Dan and Abra reenacting the roles of Jack and young Danny, respectively); which was heavily omitted from Kubrick's 1980 adaptation of the latter much to King's disappointment.

Cameo: Danny Lloyd, who played the character Danny Torrance in The Shining, makes a cameo in this movie at the baseball game and is listed in the credits as "Spectator."

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