Terrifying Stephen King story to be made into a movie for the first time

For many, Giancarlo Esposito is inextricably linked to his role as the chilling Gus Fring in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul.

In recent years, he’s also made a name for himself as a villain in The Mandalorian and The Boys, and now he’s looking to take his experience with these controlled, dangerous characters in a new direction.

Esposito is working on a film adaptation of Stephen King’s short novel The Dreamers from the 2024 collection You Like It Darker.

According to multiple industry sources, the deal is close and the project is described as a Lovecraft-inspired horror story that favors slow, creeping creepiness over cheap shocks.

The actor has been in King’s universe before. He had a small role in the 1986 film Maximum Overdrive and later appeared in the premiere episode of the horror anthology Creepshow, based on King’s short story “Gray Matter”.

Now he will not only play the lead role, but also be the driving force behind a film adaptation that many fans have been hoping for.

Sending dream testers into nightmares

The Dreamers is considered by many readers to be the scariest story in You Like It Darker.

While other King stories build slowly around small communities or family dramas, this story is closer to classic cosmic horror.

The protagonist is a skilled transcriptionist who takes a job with an eccentric scientist in the well-known King town of Castle Rock, Maine.

The job involves helping with experiments to uncover what lies beneath the surface of people’s dreams.

The test subjects are given a hypnotic drink and asked to stare at a picture of a house in a forest. They are asked to imagine they are entering the house and exploring each room.

At first, the experiments lead to small, disturbing details and inexplicable reactions from the participants.

Later, the story gradually slides into a deeply shocking nightmare.

Esposito makes no secret of the fact that he sees the film project as an important part of his creative development:

– “I see myself as an actor who loves to move around in different areas of my creative journey, so film is very important to me.

Strong horror name on the script

Giancarlo Esposito is not alone in his ambitions. Guy Busick, who most recently co-wrote the vampire film Abigail with Esposito in the cast, will deliver the script for “The Dreamers”.

Busick has already established himself as a central figure in modern horror with titles such as Ready Or Not, Scream (2022), Scream VI and Final Destination: Bloodlines on his resume.

He has also previously worked in Stephen King’s fictional universe as a screenwriter and story editor on the second season of the Castle Rock series.

At the same time, Esposito has other movie plans in the works. He is developing a film adaptation of the upcoming graphic novel The Venetian, which he co-created with writer Matt Wheeler and storyboard artist Jay Martin.

This underlines his desire to have more to say behind the camera and not just in front of it.

Horror fans will hope that the combination of Esposito’s intense presence and Busick’s experience of modern horror cinema will translate King’s dream experiments into a film that both feels true to the source material and creates new nightmares in the darkness of the theater.