Horror lovers who were thrilled by 2017’s It would be pleased to know that another horror story published in 1993 is on its way to the big screen. Comic book artist Scott Hampton’s creator-owned graphic novel is in works and an announcement from the studio can be expected soon.
Earlier last week, I had the chance to sit down with comic book artist Scott Hampton at Bangalore Comic-con to discuss his ongoing work with American Gods: Shadows and spoke about his past projects with Marvel, DC and his very own, The Upturned Stone.
An earlier interview by Deccan Herald revealed details that Hampton was in talks with production houses and was hoping to see the book make its way to the big screen. However, from our chat with the comic book artist, we can confirm that the project is already in pre-production.
For those unaware, The Upturned Stone is a ghost story graphic novel by Scott Hampton. It is a coming of age story of four boys that takes place in 1969. The story originally appeared in the September 1993 edition of Heavy Metal magazine.
During our chat, Hampton spoke in detail about his long journey to bring The Upturned Stone to the big screen. The Transcribe of his response to the question from our video interview can be found below.
Still of Scott Hampton from Bangalore Comic-con 2017
Karthik Prasad: I came to know you’re having talks with production houses to bring The Upturned Stone to the big screens. That’s really great news- anything you can add to that?
Scott Hampton: People have been asking to make it as a film [The Upturned Stone], ever since it came out. About 8-10 years ago, David Foster (Producer known for The Thing, Mask of Zorro) came to me, he’s a producer in Hollywood and he wanted to see if he could get it set up. I said, “Sure”. And he did, twice with Weinstein Company and once with Warner Independent film. All those time it went into developing but the problem was they wanted to turn it into something it wasn’t. This is a coming of age story about four kids, it’s not a slasher film, it’s not a torture porn film.
Then the efforts were made to turn it into something it wasn’t. When the time came to give it a green light. They would back out and say, “It doesn’t feel like anything special.” Now, its 2017. Stranger Things is on television and the movie IT just came out and it was very large. And as a result, We had an audition with production houses to see which was going to be the best fit. We have chosen but the problem is I can’t tell you which one because they want to announce it themselves once it’s all set up.
These people are a very big production company. They wanna make it as a studio film not as an independent film. It’s moving forward and it’s in pre-production already. Once they make the announcement, hopefully everything will be nice and set up, they’ll have a director and will be able to move forward after that. My hope is that not this coming Halloween, but the one after it, the movie might come out.
2017 took horror fans by a storm with It, Annabelle 2, Get Out and several other titles. It was a reminder to big production houses that the Horror genre is being craved by the public as much as the superhero genre.
New Line’s It earned over $694 million at the worldwide box office. It’s earning along with the recent Justice League and others pushed Warner Bros. to pass its $5billion mark for the second time.
Perhaps, Hampton’s The Upturned Stone which also revolves its story around kids similar to It could make the big buck. Furthermore, unlike the It movie, it doesn’t look like The Upturned Stone would be an R Rated film. “The story as I constructed it, would be PG, It’s likely to stay a PG film,” said Hampton.
The film is likely to attract the masses with a PG rating. For now, we’ll have to be on a lookout for an announcement from the studio.
