When Hollywood was just acres of orange groves, and the film industry was still centered in Fort Lee, New Jersey, books were already being adapted to movies. The first Shakespearean play was adapted for the screen in 1899 (King John), and the first feature-length film was an adaptation of Victor Hugo’s novel Les Misérables in 1909. Some directors, like Alfred Hitchcock, worked almost entirely off adapted screenplays. While the attraction is easy to understand (a detailed story, fully developed characters, an audience ready to watch the book come to life), there’s that ever-present risk of hearing that time-worn criticism: “The book is better than the movie.”
The Fall of the House of Usher is a mini-series based on the Edgar Allan Poe story of the same name from the co-creator of The Midnight Club.