‘The Dark Tower’ writer-producer Akiva Goldsman speaks for controversial Idris Elba casting as Roland Deschain; Stephen King talks about movie adaptations

'The Dark Tower' is an upcoming science-fiction and horror-fantasy film based on Stephen King's novels of the same name. Writer-producer Akiva Goldsman expressed his enthusiasm over the controversial casting of Idris Elba as the main protagonist Roland Deschain. Meanwhile, Stephen King also gave his opinion about books turned into movies.

According to Cinema Blend, writer and producer Akiva Goldsman expressed his enthusiasm over the controversial casting of Idris Elba as the main protagonist Roland Deschain. In the original story books, Deschain was portrayed as a stereotypical western white man. Elba is of Sierra Leonean-British descent.

Goldsman said, "I'm unbelievably proud of it as a collaborator on this enterprise and because I think that he's a great actor and I couldn't be more thrilled that he is likely to play a part... I understand that people who are thoughtful about the storytelling and the racial politics of the storytelling might want to understand how that informs that storytelling, and I respect that and I hear that, and those things are not things we didn't think about or don't think about. The racist a******* should go f*** themselves."

The Academy Award-winning film and television writer, producer and director joined the new film as screenwriter. He made it clear that an actor's race is not essential to the storytelling process, just like what author Stephen King said in a previous interview.

According to a Movie Web, King admitted that the actor's skin color did not matter as long as he can portray characters properly. He said, "What I care about is how fast he can draw... and that he takes care of the ka-tet."

Meanwhile, King shared his own opinions over books adapted into full-feature films. During an interview with Deadline, he said, "As far as creative input, my feeling is pretty simple with this: be all the way out, and let 'em do their work, and don't get involved and throw monkey wrenches and all this."

The 68-year old author added that should his books be adapted into films, he wants to have a certain degree of control over certain things. He said, "I want a dollar, and I want approvals over the screenwriter, the director and the principal cast... In all the time we've been doing this, I've never put up a red light to anybody about anything that they wanted to do. Because if they want to make changes, if they want to be a little bit out on the edge, I'm all for it. I like it."

'The Dark Tower' is an upcoming science-fiction and horror-fantasy film directed by Nikolaj Arcel. It is a live-action adaptation of Stephen King's series of fantasy novels of the same name. It is scheduled to be released on January 13, 2017.  

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