From The Haunting of Hill House, Gerald's Game, Doctor Sleep, to now Carrie, writer-director Mike Flanagan has left a trail of popular book-to-screen adaptations. "I’ve had this chance a few times in my career where I get to take something we all think we know and take it apart into all its pieces and use it to build something new," Mike Flanagan casually notes, before admitting to have read Stephen King's Carrie over 50 times while adapting it as a miniseries for Prime Video, which premiered on the streaming platform on October 7.
It's been more than five decades since the original book was published, and the novel has been adapted multiple times for the screen, including the iconic Brian De Palma film in 1976, which earned Sissy Spacek the Oscar Award for Best Actress for portraying Carrie. On the choice to revisit the story, Mike Flanagan says, "The world has changed so much in the fifty years since Stephen King wrote the original book. So, it felt like we had a terrific opportunity to do a different kind of adaptation." Samantha Sloyan, who plays Carrie White's overprotective mother, Margaret White, in the series, explains how the recent adaptation stands apart from its predecessors. "Although it is based on Stephen King’s book, Mike has changed it on a fundamental level. For example, he has made Carrie and Margaret a loving mother and daughter, which changes who Carrie is as a person. Even though we are hitting a lot of familiar beats and revisiting the iconic moments from the story, Mike’s version is a different story."
A story doesn't cross decades without finding consistent cultural resonance. According to Mike Flanagan, the relatability of Carrie is reflective of a sad reality. "We are talking about a story that is about bullying and cruelty and that kind of social tragedy is just as relevant today or even more relevant today than it was back then," he says. Much like the story, the act of bullying, the central topic of the story, has itself evolved over the years. "So much of the bullying has moved online, hasn't it? It is easier to bully people and be far more effective in bullying people when you are not face to face anymore. You can torment them virtually," says Flanagan, while Summer H Howell, who plays Carrie White in the series, adds, "It’s really rough growing up as a kid now, going to school, not fitting in, trying to figure yourself out but feeling like you need to constantly be online and creating a persona. It is also easier to get bullied because it can follow you home. Kids aren’t taught to put their phones down." The actor emphatically points out how a major part of growing up involves experiencing the freedom to make mistakes and grow as a person, which has been snatched away in the era of social media. The writer-director points out how even a horror mastermind like Stephen King couldn't have dreamt up the kind of cruelty that kids have to deal with due to bullying. He says, "As bullying has changed and our understanding of it has changed, it has provided all sorts of new torments for Carrie White to deal with, the kind of which even Stephen King could have never imagined.”
While bullying is at the centre of Carrie, Flanagan points out that the central emotion is "cruelty and our propensity for cruelty." He then adds, "The horror of Carrie for me is more about the unintended consequences, and how far these things can go and how sooner or later they could erupt violently in ways no one involved intended to." Such a heavy core naturally translates into an emotionally intense experience for an actor like Summer Howell, who plays the titular role. She admits with a sigh, "Carrie is a very emotionally intense character to play. I am an emotional person myself, and I love to use that in my work, but if you have to do that for five months straight, and you’re expected to cry or scream quite a few times in the week, it gets taxing both mentally and physically. My amazing friends and co-workers helped me through it."
For Samantha Sloyan, the story is more about the tussle with the choices we are forced to make. "Sometimes, being kind might seem tougher than being cruel. It’s all about what you do in those moments." Mike Flanagan goes a layer deep and reveals how the enduring appeal of Carrie, its relatability, and its horror are interconnected through a thread of sombre reality. "This is the kind of story that is always going to be relatable because we see ourselves in Carrie, and we also see ourselves in her tormentors."
