The Kingcast

"They're coning to get you, Barbara." One of the most iconic and oft-repeated lines in horror movie history and we have both the person who said it and the one he said it to on The Kingcast to talk all about the legacy of George A. Romero's genre-setting 1968 classic Night of the Living Dead, the impact that it had on Stephen King, and their own personal favorite King stories.

Judith O'Dea and Russ Streiner are delightful and filled with so many stories about Romero, making a genre classic, and all the fallout, both good and ill, that...

The last thing we expected to arrive in ye ol' Kingcast mailbox was an email from Disney+ saying "hey, we think there's a Stephen King connection you might like in our super popular family-friendly cartoon series." Thankfully they did reach out, though, because we ended up with this delightful chat with Big City Greens's co-creator, Shane Houghton, who arrived to fill us in on getting King himself on as a cameo in their brand new Halloween episode.

We talk about what it was like for a die hard King fan to work with his favorite author, how...

This past weekend The Kingcast held a live show at Fantastic Fest in Austin, TX. The guest was genre filmmaker Mike P. Nelson who was at the fest for his new flick, a giant killer snake tale called Beware Boiuna starring Jessica Rothe, Kiana Madeira, and Kingcast alum Logan Marshall-Green. It must also be noted that Mike was just announced as the director taking over the SAW franchise.

He's a good dude and joined Vespe on stage at the raucous Highball to talk a bit about Joe Hill and Stephen King's collaboration: Throttle, a story he's actively...

Children of the Corn continues to be a Stephen King staple after all these years so it's fitting that the Kingcast boys get a chance to corner actor and musician Courtney Gains to talk about his experiences playing the red-headed, scythe-wielding, teenage rapscallion Malachai.

Of course we also talk about some of his other endeavors as well, from his latest album, Liberation Day (available now), to his memorable turn as one of the mysterious Klopeks in Joe Dante's The 'Burbs. 

Courtney was never less than open about his career experiences, good and bad, and the r...

Kingcast favorite Kate Siegel (Haunting of Hill House, Midnight Mass) returns to the show to discuss her latest genre appearance as the special guest star for the Season 3 premiere episode of The Creep Tapes, debuting next Tuesday, September 15th on Shudder/AMC+. 

We talk about the sexual politics of that episode, her working relationship with star Mark Duplass, and how she prepared for one specific tender, yet powerful moment in the episode before we moved on to talk about her Stephen King fandom, her experiences directing an episode of the upcoming Carrie, and, of course, the topic a...

If you're a weirdo like us here at The Kingcast then you'll hold Casper Kelly's work up as an ideal beacon of the bizarre. From Too Many Cooks to his Cheddar Goblin commercial in Mandy, Kelly's been bouncing between pitch perfect nostalgia and crap-your-pants creepiness his whole career. 

He finally got to make a feature film called Buddy, which is essentially what if Barney was really a hellish purgatory for the characters trapped inside the tube. Yes, it's as sweet as it sounds. Bloody, profane, and fun as all hell. 

Kelly joins The Kingcast boys to...

Are The Boulet Brothers the hardest working drag queens in the world? There's an easy case to be made that they are. From hosting their long-running and Emmy nominated show The Boulet Brothers' Dragula, to guest-editing Heavy Metal, to producing and hosting their Creatures of the Night podcast, it's a wonder Dracmorda and Swanthula Boulet found the time to join Vespe and Breznican to talk over Mike Flanagan's adaptation of Stephen King's Shining sequel, Doctor Sleep.

Join in on this rambunctious conversation in which we talk about how drop dead sexy Rose the Hat is, debate about...

This past weekend we lost genre great Chuck Russell, who directed the best Nightmare On Elm Street sequel, one of the best horror remakes (The Blob), and introduced the world to Cameron Diaz in The Mask. Last year we had the great pleasure of interviewing him on this show, so in honor of the man and his legacy we're rerunning that chat this week.

Most of the conversation revolves around his remake of schlockfest Witchboard and his early career collaboration with one Mr. Frank Darabont. He had a front row seat to Darabont's pursuit of Stephen King's...

One of the most common questions we receive here at The Kingcast is where to start. It's not an easy question to answer, especially given the mountain of work the author has put out and continues to add on to year by year.

So Vespe and Breznican brought in acclaimed genre author Nat Cassidy (When The Wolf Comes Home, Nestlings, I Know A Place) to talk through different titles and determine what we think the best Starter King is.

Is it a Short Story? Is it a famous book? How challenging is too challenging? And...

NYT Best Selling Author and Kingcast favorite guest Stephen Graham Jones (The Only Good Indians, The Buffalo Hunter Hunter) makes his triumphant return to the show to delve into the rural weirdness of Stephen King's Children of the Corn. 

Discussion flickers between the original King short story and the not-that-great 1984 film adaptation of the same name starring Linda Hamilton and Peter Horton. How many Corn Children could Stephen Graham Jones take out before they overwhelm him? Is there's a good movie that could be made out of this admittedly pulpy source material? What were the Corn Children u...

Who better to pontificated about the similarities and differences between two of the most popular American authors of all time than Ray Bradbury's own chosen biographer and your dedicated Kingcast boys.

New York Times best selling author, biographer, and journalist Sam Weller (The Bradbury Chronicles: The Life of Ray Bradbury) makes his first appearance on The Kingcast to discuss his relationship with Bradbury, the interactions both he and Bradbury had with Stephen King (and Steven Spielberg for that matter), and why Bradbury never had a Frank Darabont or Rob Reiner that could truly translate his words into...

One of our greatest working character actors joins up for his first appearance on The Kingcast. You know Stephen Root from just about everything, from Office Space to King of the Hill to No Country For Old Men to Man In The High Castle and the recent hit horror/comedy show Widow's Bay.

Root shows up ready to rock as we look back over his career, from working with George A. Romero on Monkey Shines to the prescience of Mike Judge's Office Space and Idiocracy, and his love of Stephen King, which started with The Stand and...

Obsession rules. It's the latest horror sensation to take over the box office and has the genre community abuzz with how good it is. So naturally we had to get two of the stars on the show to talk about their cool ass movie and their favorite Stephen King things.

So, we're joined by Michael Johnston and Cooper Tomlinson and topics include their Stephen King origin stories, which King movie adaptations have influenced their work, and so much more. You will get talk about Stand By Me, The Shining, 11/22/63, Mike Flanagan, Pennywise, and even a little more...

University of Maine Professor (and the Stephen E. King Chair in Literature, by the way) Caroline Bicks spent a year combing through King's original manuscripts at his own personal archive and that resulted in an essential book for King obsessives: Monsters In The Archives that gives us new insights into King's process and illuminates paths not taken on some of his most iconic stories, like The Shining, Pet Sematary, Carrie, Night Shift, and 'Salem's Lot.

These bonus episodes are usually exclusive to The Kingcast Patreon, so if you want more of this make sure to sign up...

Screenwriter Jeremy Slater (Moon Knight, The Exorcist, Mortal Kombat II) returns to The Kingcast to talk about... not Stephen King. Well, not directly, anyway. The topic up for discussion is Joe Hill's 2025 epic horror tome King Sorrow which contains many familial references and those don't just include his famous father. 

The story centers a group of college friends who uncover the ability to summon a dark force to combat their enemies, but like most dark forces this protection comes at a price.Hill tells this story over multiple decades and litters the narrative with nods to many K...

The very funny Nick Kocher and Brian McElhaney had never seen David Cronenberg's The Dead Zone, so naturally we had to make them watch it and report back. You know Nick & Brian collectively as BriTANiK from their sketch work at SNL, their writing on It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and the two movies they have coming out this April: Pizza Movie, which they wrote and directed and is out now on Hulu, and Over Your Dead Body, hitting theaters this very weekend. 

So, what did they think of Cronenberg's film? Well, you'll have to listen and find o...

William Sadler has been in some of the best Stephen King adaptations, including the Frank Darabont Trifecta of The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, and The Mist and now he's on The Kingcast to discuss all that plus detours to his starring role in Tales From The Crypt: Demon Knight, his oddly nude bad guy in Die Hard 2, Death in Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey, and his latest film, a tongue-in-cheek genre flick called The Yeti, which is out on digital April 10th.

Sadler is one of our best character actors and has some great stories to...

I hope you brought your sad tissues with you today because this episode gets emotional real dang quickly. Our guest is Wil Wheaton who is returning to The Kingcast to talk about all things Stand By Me and The Body as Rob Reiner's film celebrates its 40th anniversary and Wil steps behind the mic and into adult Gordy LaChance's shoes as he narrates a new audiobook of Stephen King's novella, The Body.

We recorded this just two days after Wheaton appeared on stage at the Oscars for Rob Reiner's memorial and let's just say the emotions are...

Horror author Nat Cassidy (When the Wolf Comes Home) has a new book of short stories coming out called I Know A Place: Rest Stop and Other Dark Detours so it was only natural that we brought him back on the show to talk about one of King's most beloved short story collections: Nightmares and Dreamscapes.

This is one of King's doorstoppers, so me, Breznican, and Nat all pick our three favorite stories and see what overlaps and what doesn't. Come of the talk of vampire urine, stay for the insightful chatter about how authors curate the...

We have something of an academic detour for you with this episode. Listen along as we're joined by Professor Andy Hageman (Director of the Center for Ethics and Public Engagement at Luther College) who recently got access to the exclusive Stephen King Archive where he got hands on with King's original typed manuscripts and discovered something fairly interesting about King's process, particularly when it comes to The Dark Half.

The Prof tells us what it was like to get that close to literary history as well as what it's like teaching King at a college level and...

Director Natasha Kermani (Abraham's Boys, The Dreadful) is our guest this week and she picked a very interesting title to discuss: Stephen King's collaboration with his son Joe Hill titled Throttle. Kermani is no stranger to the work of Joe Hill, having adapted his story Abraham's Boys last year, and has some keen insights into both father and son's work, especially how both authors wrote about those very specific roles.  

Kermani's latest film, The Dreadful, starring Game of Thrones's Sophie Turner and Kit Harington, alongside Mrs. Carmody herself, Marcia Gay Harden, releases in a theater near you F...

Mr. Clarke himself, Randy Havens, joins The Kingcast boys to talk about the final Stranger Things season, the not-so-chill fans that showed up in its wake, working with Frank Darabont and looking back at Darabont's very first Stephen King adaption: The Woman in the Room. 

For those sensitive listeners out there, consider this fair warning: when our guest Mallory O'Meara (Girly Drinks, The Lady from the Black Lagoon) pops up on The Kingcast, things tend to get a little raunchy and this episode is no exception. She may be a James Beard award winning author, but she also hosts a podcast called Reading Smut.

Mallory returns to the show to finally dive into some Dark Tower waters as the topic turns to Stephen King's novella The Little Sisters of Eluria, which takes place not too long before the first novel in the...

It is time to return to Mid-World in this final Kingcast episode of 2025 as indie horror star Graham Skipper (Re-Animator: The Musical, Almost Human, Beyond the Gates) joins Breznican and Vespe to discuss the fourth book in Stephen King's Dark Tower series: Wizard and Glass. 

We break down the plot, underline how it weirdly mirrors the plot that George Lucas would later use for The Phantom Menace, and take a deep dive into how this book really plays to King's strength at mixing intricate character work and unbelievable world-building. 

Rob Reiner and his wife, Michele, were tragically murdered over the weekend and the film community is still reeling. Reiner was not only a kind man, someone dedicated to protecting the rights and freedoms of everybody, and a talented filmmaker, he was one of the very few filmmakers that understood exactly how to translate Stephen King to the big screen.

Author Nat Cassidy (The Wolf at the Door) and film commentator Drew McWeeny (The Hip Pocket Podcast) join Beznican and Vespe to discuss the tragic loss of Reiner and celebrate his massive contributions to the world of cinema...

If you're a fan of SCREAM then you're going to want to pay attention to today's episode featuring none other than Stu Macher and Billy Loomis themselves, Matthew Lillard and Skeet Ulrich. They're appearing in the upcoming Five Nights At Freddy's 2 and they decided to stop by The Kingcast to talk about their love of King's work and specifically Frank Darabont's adaptation of The Shawshank Redemption.

We also talk about their real life friendship, the stain that is toxic masculinity, working with Wes Craven on the original Scream, and even about Skeet's rather... interesting... appearance as a poster...

Peter Hall and Paul Gandersman, the writer/directors behind the upcoming genre flick MAN FINDS TAPE, join your intrepid Kingcast hosts to discuss one of Stephen King's underappreciated and as yet unadapted books: Joyland. 

Conversation jumps between their film, their deep cut Stephen King origin stories, some Dark Tower nerdiness, and why Joyland plays so well into King's strengths as an author. We even fancast our adaptation and do a damn good job at it, if we don't say so ourselves.

Pop culture experts and the hosts of HBO's It: Welcome to Derry Official Companion Podcast, Marc Bernardin and Princess Weekes, join Breznican and Vespe in the crossover event of the decade! What better place to land Marc and Princess than The Kingcast where we can talk through Stephen King stuff, the deeper themes at play in It: Welcome to Derry, and what it's like running the official HBO companion podcast for this series.

At long last director Edgar Wright finally makes an appearance on The Kingcast and he brought some friends along. Wright stops by to talk about his current Stephen King adaptation, The Running Man, and it just so happens that his cast was also promoting the movie so you're going to get Stephen King Origin Stories (TM) from stars Glen Powell, Lee Pace, and Josh Brolin before a lengthy chat with Edgar about constructing this particular adaptation, Stephen King's reaction to it and notes along the way, the Richard Bachman of it all, and King's adoration of Shaun of the Dead.

The Kingcast's Eric Vespe and Anthony Breznican are doing their own watch along show as HBO's It: Welcome to Derry rolls out. Check out this exclusive feed drop as they dive into episode 1 of the Pennywise prequel show from the creators of the It films. If you like what you hear make sure to subscribe to Watching It: Welcome to Derry to hear Brez and Vez discuss each episode week to week!

The day is here! Andy and Barbara Muschietti, the creative duo behind the It films and the upcoming prequel series, have finally come on The Kingcast to talk all about dat boy, Pennywise. Or is it dat girl, Pennywise? This is one of many topics brought up as Andy and Barbara discuss their love of King's work, the challenges of adapting for both the big and small screen, and even share some never before revealed details about a massive scene cut from It: Chapter One.

Upcoming genre directors Chris Stuckmann (Shelby Oaks) and Mercedes Bryce Morgan (Bone Lake) join Vespe for a very special live recording from this year's Fantastic Fest in Austin, TX.

This broad King conversation hones in on a couple of specific titles, including the recent The Long Walk adaptation, Mike Flanagan's Doctor Sleep adaptation, and someone insane tries to defend Secret Window starring Johnny Depp.

Clark Collis returns to The Kingcast to discuss a very specific moment in horror cinema: the '90s through the early 2010s. His new book, Screaming and Conjuring, takes us through that era of many hits, twice as many misses, and a genre that was feeling lost as it whiplashed between generic studio remakes, found footage ripoffs, and torture porn.

King's genre work was getting some pretty bad adaptations in this era, too, and we discuss that, King's own film criticism work at Entertainment Weekly, and his support for the genre even when it was down and out.

You know him as young Ben Hanscom in the recent It films and now Jeremy Ray Taylor is all growed up. He's a married man and works with cars, but he still acts and has a new project out in theaters, an action comedy by the name of London Calling where he co-stars with Josh Duhamel as a nerdy kid forced to tag along with a lousy hitman by his mobster father in order to toughen him up some.

We talk about that movie as well as his experiences working on It: Chapters 1 and 2, before we dive into...

This past July, Vespe and Breznican moderated the San Diego Comic-Con panel for The Long Walk. Now you get to hear the audio from that panel as well as a post-panel discussion with Mark Hamill, David Jonsson, Garrett Wareing, Tut Nyuot, screenwriter JT Mollner, and producer Roy Lee. You'll never guess the two very distinct connections between Star Wars and Stephen King that Hamill reveals, plus you get to hear everybody's Stephen King origin story.

Two of the stars of The Long Walk jump on the line with Brez and Vespe to talk about their Stephen King adaptation, their favorite King things, and so much more. Ben Wang plays Hank Olson, the motor-mouthed smartass of the group, and Garrett Wareing plays Stebbins, the odds on favorite to win the deadly game.

Listen as Wang talks about an impactful viewing of The Shining on an airplane of all places, and as Wareing breaks down the process of shooting a film like The Long Walk and what kind of prep goes into such a physically...

The Lawnmower Man himself finally makes an appearance on The Kingcast. Jeff Fahey's career is impressive just by itself, but doubly impressive for us Stephen King nerds when you realize he's something of King royalty, popping up in adaptations of The Institute, Under the Dome, and, yes, The Lawnmower Man. We discuss all three, plus talk about his latest film, The Final Run, out in select theaters and on demand right now.

Not only is Ben Barnes well-spoken, professional, and ridiculously good-looking, he's also the star of a currently running TV adaptation of Stephen King's The Institute. We talk about his process working on that show, what he took from King's writing, his history with genre (from playing Prince Caspian in the Narnia films to appearances in Westworld and Black Mirror), and share a laugh over cat buttholes. In short, this is just the nerdy conversation you need this week.

Legendary writer/director Chuck Russell (The Blob, Nightmare on Elm Street 3: The Dream Warriors, The Mask) joins The Kingcast boys to talk about his career and his new film, a reimagining of the '80s cheeseball classic Witchboard, and his early days working with Frank Darabont. Get the inside scoop on Chuck's front row seat to Darabont getting The Shawshank Redemption made as well as genre insights and lots of talk of the occult.

Celebrated novelist and comic book writer Benjamin Percy joins Breznican and Vespe to discuss Stephen King's Cycle of the Werewolf and its bonkers film adaptation, Silver Bullet. He has an ulterior motive showing up around these parts as well and that's to reveal that Stephen King himself is taking part in his next project, a post-apocalyptic story that will be released monthly in old school newspaper format. 

Most of the material will be written by Percy, but King decided he wanted a column in "The End Times." To find out more about that and how to pre-order, visit h...