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Fifty years after his debut novel Carrie, Stephen King remains a major name in horror. So when writer/director Gary Dauberman signed on to adapt King’s second novel Salem’s Lot, he made sure to stay faithful to the source. And that fidelity. included keeping the movie in the same decade as the 1975 book. Turns out, that wasn’t much of a challenge. “Most of my stuff is set in the ’70s,” Dauberman told Vanity Fair. “I love the music. I do love the costumes. I just love the vibe of it.”
Salem’s Lot tells the story of writer Ben Mears (Lewis Pullman), who returns to his tiny hometown Jerusalem’s Lot in time to discover that it’s been invaded by vampires. It’s the type of story that works best in the 1970s, before social media and cell phones make it easier to keep tabs on one another and clock when somebody’s gone missing. But even outside that rationale, it’s clear that Dauberman loves the decade. After getting his start as a writer on the Conjuring spinoffs, including Annabelle and The Nun, as well as writing the big screen versions of Stephen King’s It, Dauberman’s directorial debut came in Annabelle Comes Home is set in the 1970s.
Furthermore, Dauberman keeps the 1970s setting because he wanted to do right by the novel: “I feel like it’s a crown jewel in King’s library, and I always thought it would make a great movie.”
Dauberman’s devotion to the book even affects the visuals of the film. According to Vanity Fair, Dauberman took inspiration from the cover of paperback versions of the book. Dauberman shot a scene in which a vampire stalks a pair a boys in black and white. “While finalizing the film with colorist Peter Doyle, [he and Dauberman] called up images of that old paperback cover to mimic its gradations of vivid, dripping red,” Vanity Fair reported.
With that said, Dauberman did take some liberties with the source material. In the book, Mears and a resistance group of townspeople—played by Makenzie Leigh, Alfre Woodard, Bill Camp, and others in the film—go from house to house looking for the vampires. Dauberman relocates the scene to a drive-in theater, which features “the bloodsuckers emerging from the darkness of their car trunks as the sun sets behind the giant white movie screen,” reported Vanity Fair. “It’s this crazy sugar-high of a scene,” Dauberman teased. “I thought, ‘Yeah, this is what this is. This is a drive-in movie.’”
Although Dauberman let a drive-in guide his vision, Salem’s Lot likely won’t play in any drive-ins any time soon. Warner Bros. is sending his film, which was initially slated for a 2022 release, directly to Max. That’s better than canceling the movie outright, which Warner did with Batgirl and Coyote vs. Acme.
Dauberman still hopes that Salem’s Lot can be a crowd-pleaser at home. “As with most horror movies, I think audiences really elevate the experience,” he shared. “So I think getting as many people as you can cram on the couch would be my preferred way to watch this.” It might not be ideal, but there’s no denying that there’s something 1970s about squeezing people together on the couch.
Salem’s Lot sneaks onto Max in October 2024.
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