Frank Darabont has been retired from filmmaking for well over a decade now. That’s why recent news that he’d temporarily come out of retirement to direct two episodes for Netflix’s “Stranger Things” was seen as a hopeful sign that he might be making a comeback. Darabont helmed two episodes of the show’s final season.
In fact, Darabont only came out of retirement for “Stranger Things” because he was a huge fan of the series: “my wife and I really love this show.”
So, does this mean he’s back in the filmmaking game? In a new interview, when asked whether his “Stranger Things” return meant he was done with retirement for good or returning to filmmaking generally, Darabont was candidly reflective rather than definitive:
Who knows? I haven’t missed the business but I have missed being on set with creative people… It may well be one and done, but we’ve still got time.
Darabont goes on to add that he no longer wants to deal with conflicts. He’ll only take on projects where executives trust the filmmaker and the atmosphere is respectful, so he can focus on creating rather than fighting battles or being undermined by the studio:
I just don’t want to fight any battles, and I don’t want to have a lack of goodwill at the top, because that lack of goodwill rolls downhill. And so if it’s a friendly place where they’re going to trust the filmmaker, yeah, I’d certainly consider it. I’m too old to fight any battles anymore. I’m too old to get swept out with the trash at their convenience.
In case you’re unfamiliar with Darabont, he’s only directed four features in 30 years, including “The Shawshank Redemption,” “The Green Mile,” and “The Mist.” He hasn’t helmed a feature since 2007 — the reasons why vary, many are just theories, and I won’t get into all of them here.
Actor Thomas Jane (“The Punisher”), who worked with Darabont on “The Mist,” mentioned on the Kingcast podcast that the filmmaker had effectively been blacklisted in Hollywood for suing AMC over “The Walking Dead.” Long story short, Darabont got screwed over by the network with his show and ended up filing some fairly heavy-duty lawsuits against them. It seems Darabont might have been in the right — he ended up winning the case and pocketing close to $200 million.
Ever since his 2011 Walking Dead exit, Darabont has done some uncredited, and fairly hush-hush, work as a script doctor on Hollywood blockbusters. He also created the 2013 TNT series “Mob City,” which lasted just six episodes.
Darabont was originally slated to direct 2009’s “Law Abiding Citizen” and 2014’s “The Huntsman: Winter’s War,” but left both productions due to “creative differences.” More interestingly, he also wrote a script for a film centered around the American Civil War, based on an unproduced screenplay by Stanley Kubrick and historian Shelby Foote. Darabont has said it’s “the best thing he’s ever written,” but no studio wanted to fund it.
Maybe the door has finally re-opened, and some of these projects can now come to fruition. Darabont is 66, which means, when compared to Scorsese, Scott, and Coppola, he has plenty of years left in the filmmaking game.
Araki wrote the screenplay, and will direct “The Decline of F*cking Western Civilization,” a dark comedy starring Ashton Kutcher, Alison Brie, and Jesse Williams. The film started shooting today in Los Angeles.