Stephen King Once Sued Studio Over Butchering His Story in Movie Adaptation
The writer was against the fact that his name was used to promote the movie.
Often in the lists of Stephen King film adaptations, you can see The Lawnmower Man. Even on the official posters of the movie, King's name is proudly displayed – it says Stephen King's The Lawnmower Man, and there are a lot of such posters in different languages.
The Lawnmower Man is the real King’s story. He wrote it in the 1970s, first published in Cavalier magazine in 1975, and later, in 1978, the story ended up in the collection Night Shift.
According to the plot, a man named called a professional to mow an overgrown lawn, but the worker turned out to be a satyr serving the ancient Greek god. As a result, the protagonist was sacrificed by a lawnmower and its red mower that came alive.
In 1992, The Lawnmower Man was released, directed by Brett Leonard and starring Jeff Fahey and Pierce Brosnan.
According to the plot, the doctor conducted experiments on the mentally retarded lawnmower Jobe Smith, as a result of which he received superintelligence and superpowers and went into virtual reality. It is not very similar to the original source, so why was King's name used in the promotion?
The fact is that in the late 1980s, Allied Vision Studios acquired the rights to the aforementioned King story, but were unable to turn it into a feature-length movie. Then the producers decided to combine King's story with another storylines about virtual reality.
The plot was written by Brett Leonard and Gimel Everett. At first, it was the original story called Cyber God, but then small elements from King's works were added.
Distributor New Line promoted the movie as Stephen King's Lawnmower Man. The movie failed and was crushed by both critics and viewers, despite the big name of the author used in advertising.
In May 1992, the author filed a lawsuit against Allied Vision and New Line Cinema, claiming that the film bore "no significant resemblance" to his story other than the title and a brief two-minute scene. King demanded that his name be removed from the ads and credits, which is not surprising considering how badly the movie failed.
But even after several court rulings in King's favor and a settlement, New Line continued to use the author's name, releasing videocassettes with his name on the cover.
Then, in 1994, a federal judge ruled that the company was in contempt of court and gave it 30 days to comply or face a fine of $10,000 a day. After some time, the studio complied.