Stephen King in conversation with Edgar Wright: “When I wrote The Running Man, 2025 seemed so far in the future that I couldn’t even grasp it in my mind”

Stephen King in conversation with Edgar Wright

“When I wrote The Running Man, 2025 seemed so far in the future that I couldn’t even grasp it in my mind”

In a standout year for adaptations of Stephen King’s work, Edgar Wright, director of The Running Man, discusses the story’s themes and their increasing relevance. The film is a dystopian thriller centered around a brutal TV gameshow used to control the masses.

“Welcome to America in 2025 when the best men don’t run for president. They run for their lives…”

This tagline appeared on the original book jacket for King’s The Running Man. The story imagines a future where a government-controlled TV network pacifies people through the violent gameshow featured in the title.

Background of the novella

The novella was first published in 1982 but written a decade earlier under King's pseudonym Richard Bachman.
It gained wider recognition in 1985 when included in The Bachman Books, which also featured early novellas Rage (1977), The Long Walk (1979), and Roadwork (1981).

Film adaptations

In 1987, Paul Michael Glaser directed a loose adaptation, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger as Ben Richards. While the film kept the deadly gameshow concept, it diverged significantly from King's story.

Now, Edgar Wright’s new adaptation is noted for its faithfulness to the original novella and is released in the very year—2025—that King imagined in his dystopian vision.

Reflection

Despite Hollywood’s typically slow pace in bringing stories to screen, Wright’s version arriving in 2025 is a striking coincidence given the novel’s futuristic setting.

Author’s summary: Edgar Wright’s faithful adaptation of Stephen King’s The Running Man powerfully explores media manipulation and dystopia, released exactly in the year King predicted.

BFI — 2025-11-07