Things you need to know about the original 'It' movie

The first half of the film adaptation of Stephen King's novel "It“ is scheduled for September, and the trailer broke records when it was first released. Many people had some strong feelings about it, and it was even discussed at the Annual Conference of professional clowns. Yet, horror movie fans are super excited about it and since this is Stephen King we’re talking about, they will probably be satisfied with the movie.

However, this isn’t the novel’s first adaptation. In 1990. ABC aired a miniseries, starring Tim Curry as a demented clown. We’ve gathered all the important facts from the series and the novel you need to know before watching the movie in September.

Novel was inspired by a true story

For those unfamiliar, this is a story about a group of young friends terrorized by a shape-shifting evil. The evil often takes the form of a clown called Pennywise (also known as “It”) that preys on the fears of its victims. Over 20 years later, the evil is back and it forces friends who survived its terrors in childhood to come together and fight it all over again in order to save themselves and the children around them.

It is said that the novel was inspired by a true story. Just a few years before King released his novel, John Wayne Gacy was arrested and declared a “killer clown”. Apparently, Gacy used to work as a professional clown at children’s parties and he created a character “Pogo the Clown”. Later, it turned out that Pogo raped and killed 33 boys in Illinois.

Lary Cohen started working on the adaptation before the book was published

The first adaptation of the novel was in the works years before the novel was published. Larry Cohen, the screenwriter of the miniseries, said that he agreed to do the adaptation after just one phone call. He added that only first 100 pages were enough to intrigue him and since it was a novel by Stephen King there was no doubt about the rest of the story.

When it comes to the 1990 “It” adaptation, t is interesting that they had only 12 million dollars for a two-night television project. This year’s reboot had a budget of 30 million dollars, and it will surely be a lot different from the original. However, the first adaptation was very successful even though it lasted for only four hours. In the beginning, it was supposed to last for eight hours but ABC was very nervous about “It” in the first place, so they didn’t allow it to last any longer.