Bringing a book to life for a movie often requires a variety of deviations from the source material, a task Andy and Barbara Muschietti were all too familiar with when adapting Stephen King‘s IT. Despite the changes required, producer Barbara recently revealed to Cinema Blend one of director Andy’s personal additions “scared the sh*t” out of the original author.
“Stephen King, the first email he sent to Andy when he had seen the movie, the one fear he wrote back, he said, ‘I f*cking love the woman in the painting, it scared the sh*t out of me,’” the producer explained of a sequence added to the film.
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The film focuses on a group of kids who band together to confront a horrifying entity plaguing the small town of Derry, ME. This “It” creature takes on various forms throughout the film to exploit the various characters’ fears, with one scene featuring a character being terrified of a bizarre and surreal painting.
To create this visage, Muschietti drew upon a real-life fear he experienced with the painting when he was a child.
“It’s a literal translation of a very personal childhood fear,” Muschietti revealed to The New York Times. “In my house, there was a print of a Modigliani painting that I found terrifying. And the thought of meeting an incarnation of the woman in it would drive me crazy.”
“He often does these portraits with elongated characters,” Muschietti explained of the artist’s work. “His vision of humans were with elongated necks, crooked faces and empty eyes most of the time. It was so deformed that as a child, you don’t see that as an artist’s style. You see it as a monster.”
IT is currently in theaters.
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