While Universal might have decided it can’t quite find enough change down the back of the sofa to fund Ron Howard’s take on Stephen King’s Dark Tower series, Warners seems to have no such qualms. Having partnered up with CBS films to nab the rightsto King’s epic, post-apocalyptic tale The Stand, the studio has now retained the services of Harry Potter stalwarts Steve Kloves and David Yates to write and direct a likely multi-film version of the story.
HitFix reports that the pair is now locking in deals to tackle the book, which sees a virus kill off 99% of the world’s population. A group of the remaining survivors must then deal not just with their shattered existence but another bunch of post-viral types led by the evil Randall Flagg.
While there have been attempts to get the story on to the big screen before (with the likes of George Romero labouring fruitlessly to make it work), The Stand was turned into a miniseries by US TV network ABC in 1994.
Yates had previously dropped mentions that he was interested in taking on the challenge when he was promoting the most recent **Harry Potter **and he’s certainly proved he can handle such a difficult gig. With Kloves also aboard, it looks like this one could actually see the light of day…