Salem’s Lot Premieres On Max This October

Salem’s Lot was only Stephen King‘s second published book, but it established a lot of his tropes: the Maine setting, the writer protagonist, the dysfunctional townspeople, and the blanketing sense of dread. Two adaptions were made for television in 1979 and 2004, but a new theatrical adaption has been created — to debut on television.

That’s correct: this was meant to be the big-screen debut of Salem’s Lot, but since Max is gonna Max, they changed their minds and are premiering the film on streaming instead. There are no official answers as to why. Maybe there’ll be a truly theatrical version of this story someday, but not today. We came close!

Author Ben Mears has returned to his childhood home of Jerusalem’s Lot, ME in search of inspiration for his next book. But something doesn’t feel the same, and the bad vibes seem to be emanating from the creepy old mansion sitting at the top of the hill. Mears hears it has a new tenant: Kurt Barlow. who resides in near solitude with his assistant Richard Straker. They say Barlow does come out at night — to feed. But that couldn’t be true, he couldn’t possibly be a VAMPIRE, right? (He’s totally a vampire.)

Lewis Pullman stars in this new version of Salem’s Lot as Ben Mears, Alfre Woodard as Dr. Cody,  Makenzie Leigh as Susan Norton,  Bill Camp as Matthew Burke, Spencer Treat Clark as Mike Ryerson, Pilou Asbæk as Straker, and John Benjamin Hickey as Father Callahan. Max hasn’t attached a specific day of release to the film, but promises they’ll get it to you before Halloween.