Novel written by horror writer
Stephen King. Published
by Viking Press, the book was released in 1986.
It is the story of a group of childhood friends who
return to their home town of Derry, Maine to fight
an ancient evil that they battled years earlier. The evil
which resides under the streets of Derry has been preying
on the children of the town for years. Its main form
is that of Pennywise the Clown, but the evil has the
ability to take the form of that which you most fear.
The book is about King's warped nostalgic trip into
those long summer afternoons that seemed to last forever and
childhood friendships that we never believed would end.
The group of friends that return are stereotypical of the
outcast group of kids that existed in most neighborhoods:
Bill Denbrough, the all-American kid who talks funny (in this case a stutter)
Richie Tozier, the smart-mouth kid who hides his insecurity behind humor
Ben Hanscom, the fat kid
Mike Hanlon, the black kid
Stan Uris, the ethnic kid (in this case, Jewish)
Eddie Kaspbrak, the small and weak kid
Beverly Marsh, the girl
This rag-tag group fights an evil that threatens their
very lives during a summer in the late 1950's. Once
they drive the evil away, they promise to come back if
it should ever return.
Like many of King's stories, It was adapted into a
television mini-series. The mini-series, though respectable,
did not possess the ability to draw the audience into
the situation the way the book did. The cast included:
Richard Thomas as Bill Denbrough
Harry Anderson as Richie Tozier
John Ritter as Ben Hanscom
Tim Reid as Mike Hanlon
Richard Masur as Stan Uris
Dennis Christopher as Eddie Kaspbrak
Annette O'Toole as Beverly Marsh
Tim Curry as Pennywise the Clown
The mini-series also included a cast of younger actors
playing the friends as children. Most of them were
relative unknowns with two notable exceptions. Seth
Green of Austin Powers and Buffy fame, played the
young Richie Tozier and Jonathan Bradis of Seaquest
DSV played the young Bill Denbrough.