‘The Life of Chuck' cast reveal their favorite Stephen King works, including Mark Hamill's love of the ‘terrifying' ‘Pet Sematary'
Tom Hiddleston, Jacob Tremblay, and Benjamin Pajak play the adult, teenage, and child versions of Charles "Chuck" Krantz, a modest accountant who grew up his dream to be a dancer. He's the central figure in the bittersweet story that's told in reverse over three acts. Flanagan wrote, directed, and produced the film that matches the tone of other non-horror adaptations from King, including Stand by Me (1986), The Shawshank Redemption (1994), and The Green Mile (1999).
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The stellar cast is rounded out by Chiwetel Ejiofor as Marty Anderson, Karen Gillan as Felicia Gordon, Mark Hamill as Albie Krantz, Annalise Basso as Janice Halliday, Mia Sara as Sarah Krantz, Matthew Lillard as Gus Wilfong, and Kate Siegel as Miss Richards.
SEE 'One of the best ever': Tom Hiddleston and Mark Hamill on why they fought to be in Mike Flanagan's 'The Life of Chuck'
Mike Flanagan: What a question! I will say, I think my favorite movie adaptation is The Shawshank Redemption. My favorite book is impossible to answer. The Dark Tower series for me is something that connects them all — I think that's his magnum opus. My favorite story to read though is The Life of Chuck, which is way up there. Hearts in Atlantis makes me cry tears of joy. The Green Mile novel is astonishing.
Tom Hiddleston: For movies, it's The Shawshank Redemption. It made a big impact on my whole life. It changed how I think about life, actually, when I watched it. It hit me at a very formative time, when I was a teenager. The compassion in the film, and the way it lands, and what redemption really is. The last 20 minutes of that film are some of the most moving from a motion picture I've ever seen.
Mark Hamill: There are so many different types of Stephen King novels. The most terrifying novel to me was Pet Sematary. I saw The Shining and walked straight from the theater to a bookstore to buy the book, so I could figure out what the hell I just saw. But I also like his books that aren't about supernatural or horror. The Body comes to mind, The Green Mile, and Shawshank Redemption. It's an embarrassment of riches.
Benjamin Pajak: I love If It Bleeds. I'm kind of biased, but I just love the stories in it. Every story in there has a place in my heart. I read it when I got cast, and I hadn't really known Stephen King before I found out I'd be in the movie. I immediately just felt connected to his writing when I read the book.
Chiwetel Ejiofor: There are very few films that I genuinely feel envious of people if they haven't seen them, 'cause I envy that first time that they watch it. I still have that feeling about The Shawshank Redemption. It's one of those films that you just want to watch somebody's face in the third act.
Karen Gillan: The Shining is probably my favorite film of all time. I love that film. I'm a Stanley Kubrick fan. It's just so terrifying and brilliant, with its exploration into this man's descent into madness. I know that Stephen King wasn't the biggest fan of the movie adaptation, but I am!
Annalise Basso: The Green Mile.
Mia Sara: Probably Stand by Me, because it's great.
Matthew Lillard: I'd go with Shawshank. The Shawshank Redemption is one of the best movies ever made. And then, the first book I ever read for my own pleasure was Christine. So, it's a toss-up between those two.
Kate Siegel: I love The Shawshank Redemption. I love it when Stephen King is singing about hope, and all of the ways hope can grow in the grossest of places. And The Green Mile is beautiful.
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Flanagan: I'd probably go with Bobby Darin, "Mack The Knife." And I don't think it's because it expresses me — I'm not a serial killer. But that song, for whatever reason, just always gets me moving.
Hiddleston: I can think of two off the top of my head. It's not possible to listen to this song without smiling: "Volare" by the Gipsy Kings. It makes people want to dance. And the other one is an old dance track from the late '90s called "Lady" by Modjo.
Hamill: I only did one Broadway musical, and I learned, these people are the hardest working people in show business. They act, they sing, they dance. They sent me to dance class six weeks before rehearsal for a turn-of-the-century musical where I had to learn clog dancing and so forth. I was very proud of myself. I would have to pick something from The Music Man. I love "Ya Got Trouble (In River City)" — I thought that was a fantastic number. It'd have to be something that a layman could learn in an afternoon.
Pajak: I'd probably say "Stayin' Alive." That's the first thing that comes into my head. I feel like that just has so much energy, and people would recognize that song and start dancing with me. If I'm the only one dancing, I would completely be embarrassed in 10 seconds.
Ejiofor: I'd probably go for some sort of early song, like "All Night Long." Just give me Lionel Richie and just go for it.
Gillan: Go-to song of expression? "No Regrets" by Édith Piaf, and I'm going to be dancing hard to that. Hard.
Basso: I'm so overwhelmed, I'm short-circuiting! Dance for me is so in the moment, that when I dance it feels like the music is a character. Although you can dance on your own, this is why I love flamenco so much, because the shoes are an instrument and you can carry that wherever you go and you can make your own music.
Sara: Prince, "Kiss." That's my favorite song! My husband and I had just been to a huge family wedding, and that's the song we like to dance to.
Lillard: "Give It to Me Baby" by Rick James. I did a movie called She's All That, and "Give It to Me Baby" was the song, so I'd probably just pull it back from the classic.
Siegel: Oh, what a great question! The one that comes to mind is "High Hopes" by Panic! At the Disco. A lot of my heart is maudlin, so I might do "Moon River" and just hobble about.
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Ejiofor: I thought it was just so richly conceived. It's sometimes difficult when you don't know when a story is going, and then you do, and you think, "How did that plane land for me? How did that all work?" Because it's kind of a big concept. And I just felt like there was just a real ease to this, it fit it into place, and it made sense. It felt profound in exactly the right way, and satisfying narratively.
Gillan: I just found it so profound and moving, and it really made me go away and question how I'm living my own life and spending the precious time that I have. And those are really valuable questions to ask yourself. I really wanted to be a part of something that can maybe spark that conversation.
Basso: I always ask myself at the end of a script, or at the end of completing a project, what did I learn from this? That's what my dad taught me. He's like, "Learn as much from your wins as you do from your losses." With this, at the end of reading the script, I was like, "What brings me joy?" And it just brought me closer to that.
Sara: I cried, and then I called Mike, and I cried on the phone with Mike, and I said, "That's so beautiful."
Lillard: The funny thing is, as you were reading it, 'cause it's backwards, it doesn't really have the impact, which really speaks to the power of Mike Flanagan. We were in Toronto and won the Audience Award — a hugely prestigious award, and we were very honored to win it — but sitting in that theater with 2,000 people, I'll never forget it goes to black to transition to the second act, and you could hear a pin drop in that theater. The power of that beat was such that it took everyone's breath away, and that was really the first time I knew we were in for something special.
Siegel: It made me feel human. Right now, it's very hard to feel your humanity, because we're being inundated with a lot of information all the time that is in extremes. It's very overwhelming, and there was something about this script that allowed everything to feel like it's people. And yes, there are rights and wrongs, and there is good and bad in the world, but also there's you, and you get to be a person, too. You deserve that.
The Life of Chuck arrives in theaters on June 6. It will be eligible at the 2026 Oscars.
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Love movies? Live for TV? USA TODAY's Watch Party newsletter has all the best recommendations, delivered right to your inbox. Sign up now and be one of the cool kids. Almost as long as that legendary master of horror Stephen King has been keeping book lovers up at night, filmmakers have been adapting his novels and short stories. Which means there have been some stone-cold classics ("The Shining," anyone?) and more than a few clunkers. For every "The Dark Tower," there's an "It" – though we got two of those, both of them good. So is the new one: Director Mike Flanagan's uplifting film "The Life of Chuck" (in theaters now), based on the novella from King's "If It Bleeds" collection, stars Tom Hiddleston as the title character whose life story gets told in reverse chronological order. It's a pretty big 2025 for King and his Constant Readers. The year has already seen the release of "The Monkey," and this fall brings dystopian thriller "The Long Walk" (Sept. 12) – with Mark Hamill torturing quite a few members of young Hollywood – and Edgar Wright's new take on "The Running Man" (Nov. 7) starring Glen Powell. And on the book front, King's latest novel "Never Flinch" is new in stores while "Hansel & Gretel," his children's book with Maurice Sendak, is out Sept. 2. In honor of "Chuck," here are the most essential King movies, ranked: Carla Gugino and Bruce Greenwood play a couple who go on a romantic getaway to rekindle their marriage. The wife gets handcuffed to the bed, hubby has a heart attack, there are no neighbors to call and she struggles to maintain her sanity in a stressful situation. (Also, good luck trying to unsee the super-duper creepy Moonlight Man.) Where to watch: Netflix. So what if this futuristic action flick isn't exactly faithful to the '82 King book (written as Richard Bachman)? It's an enjoyable time watching Arnold Schwarzenegger as a framed military man on a brutally deadly game show, tackling over-the-top bruisers and TV host baddie Richard Dawson in a movie that's more WrestleMania than social satire. Where to watch: Paramount+, Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. Gory and gloriously absurd, the horror comedy stars Theo James in a dual role as twins who thought they got rid of a cursed monkey toy when they were kids until it comes back into their lives and brings a whole heap of bloody death. Sure, it's extremely demented, but this wacky film also has something deep to say about mortality. Where to watch: Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. The sentimental prison drama based on King's serial novel gets its hooks in thanks to the one-two emotional punch of Tom Hanks and Michael Clarke Duncan. Hanks plays a death row prison guard who doesn't know what to make of a gentle but enigmatic giant (Duncan), convicted of murdering two girls, who exhibits strange abilities. Where to watch: Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. In the most underrated King movie, a supernatural skeptic (John Cusack) who writes about haunted places takes interest in the legendarily creepy room of a New York high-rise. It's astoundingly kooky but also a thoughtful study of cynicism and belief. Where to watch: Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. Ewan McGregor stars in "The Shining" sequel as a grown-up Danny Torrance, decades past surviving the horrors at the Overlook Hotel, now sober after years of alcoholism and helping a young psychic girl (Kyliegh Curran). It mines familiar ground by carrying over "Shining" themes and characters, but it's best going its own way as a reluctant hero's journey. Where to watch: Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. King is as much a master of Americana as he is frights, and Rob Reiner's coming-of-age tale of four misfits and their adventures to find a dead body is top notch at capturing the unbreakable bond of friendship and the fleeting nature of childhood innocence. Where to watch: Paramount+, Pluto TV, Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. How do you make a King novella even more bleak? Director Frank Darabont manages to do that rather well with this story of small-town Maine folks stuck in a supermarket, thanks to a mysterious mist and monstrous hidden creatures outside. Come for the paranoia and tribalism, stay for the gut-punch ending. Where to watch: Paramount+, Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. A modern take might have nutty Annie Wilkes making a TikTok or simply sliding into the DMs of author Paul Sheldon to profess her fandom but it wouldn't have been so malevolently perfect as this pre-Internet chiller. Kathy Bates earns her Oscar and then some, taking Annie's terrifying adoration for James Caan's Sheldon to a disturbing, hide-your-eyes level. Where to watch: Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. Christopher Walken is a psychic schoolteacher who 'sees' someone's secrets if he touches them, including a vision of a nuclear holocaust after shaking the hand of a senatorial candidate (Martin Sheen). More than 40 years later, the film's political bent seems timelier than ever. Where to watch: Pluto TV, Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. Sissy Spacek exudes quiet, tortured grace as a teenager just blossoming into womanhood, leading to bullying from classmates and her abusively religious mom (Piper Laurie). The last 30 minutes is a jaw-dropping transformation from childhood innocence to murderous hysteria. Where to watch: Max, Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. Taking the friendship stuff from "Stand by Me" and weaving in a deliciously evil clown in a poufy wardrobe, "It" works magic on a lot of different levels and leaves you desperately seeking more Pennywise. Warning: May not be for those skeeved out by buckets of blood shooting out of a sink. Where to watch: Max, Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. A more life-affirming, dance-filled Stephen King movie than you probably expect. Featuring Tom Hiddleston as a businessman with some sweet moves, it's a proudly unconventional flick that begins with the end of the world and ends with a haunted attic, and everything in between is a thought-provoking delight. Where to watch: In theaters. There's not much scary here other than some jail guards. Instead, what makes "Shawshank" an all-timer is the core friendship of two inmates (played by Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman) who figure out they'd better 'get busy living or get busy dying." Where to watch: Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. King notoriously disliked Stanley Kubrick's masterpiece, but it's the best of the entire lot. Come for the infamous scenes – 'Heeeeere's Johnny,' anyone? – and stay for the exceptional exploration of isolation, one man's descent into madness, and the terrifying effect on his family. Where to watch: Max, Apple TV, Amazon, Fandango at Home. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: The best Stephen King movies, ranked (including 'Life of Chuck')
