So here's the thing: regular listeners know that I am a HUUUUUUGE Shirley Jackson geek, and while I appreciate all her work, my favorite of her novels is the first I read: The Haunting of Hill House, her 1959 masterpiece. The 1963 adaptation by Robert Wise is genius; the 1999 remake by Jan DeBont is vile. When Netflix announced last year that it would be releasing a ten episode adaptation, you can imagine that I was incredibly excited.
I've been increasingly nervous, however; the IMDB page doesn't list any of the characters from the novel, save for Mr. and Mrs. Dudley, the Gothic (to say the least) groundskeeper and his grim wife the housekeeper. I was holding out hope that because featured actors like Carla Gugino, Timothy Hutton, and Oliver Cohen-Jackson didn't (and still don't) have characters listed, they would be playing Eleanor, Dr. Montague, and Luke Sanderson respectively, the main characters from Jackson's novel.
But then I read this at the AV Club ...
"Flanagan’s riff deviates from the original’s motley crew of paranormally gifted guests, who are invited to the titular house by a doctor devoted to finding scientific evidence of the supernatural. Here, the story centers around “a group of siblings who, as children, grew up in what would go on to become the most famous haunted house in the country.” The story will reportedly flit back and forth between the past and a modern-day present as it finds the siblings (and, per the photos, their families) revisiting the house “in the face of tragedy.”
... and my hopes went out the window.
I'm still looking forward to the adaptation (I really enjoyed director Mike Flanagan's Gerald's Game last spring, which also featured Gugino); but I'm extremely disappointed that Netflix appears to be abandoning the Jackson characters, who are the ENTIRE REASON THAT I LOVE THE BOOK -- the history of Hill House is fascinating, sure, but that isn't the point of the novel. The point is following protagonist Eleanor Vance's mental disintegration, and wrestling with questions like, "Was it Eleanor ... was it the house ... are there even ghosts at all?" The house is awesome; ultimately, the house doesn't matter.
Oh, Netflix ... you're scaring me. And not necessarily in the good way.
