A few months after we learned that Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey were in talks to play Roland Deschain and the Man in Black in the multimedia adaptation of The Dark Tower series, the casting has been confirmed… by none other than Stephen King himself. King tweeted the news in the form of the first line of The Gunslinger:
It’s official: The man in black fled across the desert and the gunslinger followed. #DarkTowerMovie @McConaughey @IdrisElba
— Stephen King (@StephenKing) March 1, 2016
King and director/co-writer Nikolaj Arcel (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) also spoke with Entertainment Weekly about how they’ll adapt King’s series—comprised of eight novels and various comic books and short stories—into a cohesive story spanning both film and television. They’re starting with that opening line (“It should start that way,” King says. “I’ve been pretty insistent about that.”), but the first movie won’t be following the plot of The Gunslinger. They shared a few hints that don’t entirely narrow down the plot. From King:
[The movie] starts in media res, in the middle of the story instead of at the beginning, which may upset some of the fans a little bit, but they’ll get behind it, because it is the story.
Arcel’s only clue:
A lot of it takes place in our day, in the modern world.
Elba and McConaughey are already getting into character on social media, in the cutest set of tweets since Robert Downey Jr. and Chris Evans started jabbing each other:
.@McConaughey you have one new follower. #DarkTowerMovie https://t.co/5fSKF02C7I
— Idris Elba (@idriselba) March 1, 2016
.@idriselba come and get me, I look forward to it. #DarkTowerMovie https://t.co/4gxqm2GPo3
— Matthew McConaughey (@McConaughey) March 1, 2016
via io9
