Edgar Wright has described his version of the Stephen King (Richard Bachman) story The Running Man as the deadliest game of hide and seek
Four years have gone by since it was announced that Edgar Wright was coming on board to direct a new take on the novel The Running Man, which was written by Stephen King under his Richard Bachman pen name. The Running Man was, of course, previously turned into a film back in 1987 that starred Arnold Schwarzenegger and had little to do with the source material. Last year, Wright’s take on the material went into production with Glen Powell of Top Gun: Maverick, Hit Man, and Twisters in the lead role – and during a recent interview, Wright described the film as “the deadliest game of hide and seek.”
King’s novel has the following description: It was the ultimate death game in a nightmare future America. The year is 2025 and reality TV has grown to the point where people are willing to wager their lives for a chance at a billion-dollar jackpot. Ben Richards is desperate – he needs money to treat his daughter’s illness. His last chance is entering a game show called The Running Man where the goal is to avoid capture by Hunters who are employed to kill him. Surviving this month-long chase is another issue when everyone else on the planet is watching – and willing to turn him in for the reward.
During an interview on the Happy Sad Confused podcast a while back, Wright said he was drawn to The Running Man because, “I like the film but I like the book more, and they didn’t really adapt the book. Even as a teenager when I saw the Schwarzenegger film I was like, ‘Oh, this isn’t like the book at all!’ And I think, ‘Nobody’s [done] that book.’ So when that came up, I was thinking, and Simon Kinberg says, ‘Do you have any interest in The Running Man?’ I said, ‘You know what? I’ve often thought that that book is something crying out to be adapted.’ Now, that doesn’t mean that it’s easy! [Laughs] But it’s something that we are working on, yes.”
Wright is directing The Running Man from a script he co-wrote with Michael Bacall and is producing the film with Nira Park and Simon Kinberg. Powell is joined in the cast by Katy O’Brian (who had a breakthrough role in Love Lies Bleeding and shared the screen with Powell in Twisters) as a contestant; Daniel Ezra, who played the character Spencer James on 106 episodes of the CW series All American; Josh Brolin (Outer Range), playing a TV executive who is the main villain; Lee Pace (Halt and Catch Fire) as a ruthless hunter; Michael Cera (Scott Pilgrim vs. the World) as a “naïve rebel who tries to help the desperate man”; Emilia Jones (CODA) as a “privileged woman blind to the oppression of the government“; David Zayas (Dexter) as a character named Richard Manuel; Colman Domingo (Fear the Walking Dead) as the host of The Running Man, a violent reality show promising an outrageous cash prize; and William H. Macy of Fargo and Boogie Nights.
Wright told Empire, “One of the things about the book that I loved was the fact that Ben Richards is out in the world on his own, so it’s like the deadliest game of hide and seek. It does feel like making a road movie in a lot of ways: a very intense, dangerous road movie. Ben is moving through different environments and meeting different people as he tries to survive 30 days out in the wild.” As for why he cast Glen Powell in the lead rather than an established action star, he said, “I felt it was important to see somebody who hadn’t really done something like this before. It’s similar to Bruce Willis, when he was still the guy from Moonlighting, before he did Die Hard, where that adds to the suspense. Can they make it?“
The Running Man is set to reach theatres on November 7th.
Are you looking forward to seeing Edgar Wright’s version of the deadliest game of hide and seek in The Running Man? Share your thoughts on this one by leaving a comment below.
