The creative team behind CBS All Access’ adaptation of The score know that you might be on your guard watching a show that revolves around a deadly virus. After all, the premiere of the miniseries is canceled well-known words like ‘quarantine’ and ‘tested positive’, and there is a lot of coughing – and we have all seen and heard that very often during the real coronavirus pandemic.
But for those unfamiliar with the Stephen King novel on which The score is based, executive producers Benjamin Cavell and Taylor Elmore can assure you that the show is more than just an eerie mirror of our current world. In fact, “it is not really a pandemic,” Cavell suggests. “It’s about the battle that follows.”
The score takes place during and after the spread of Captain Trips, a highly contagious strain of flu that wipes out most of the world’s population. Left in its wake is a group of survivors – including Stu Redman (Dead to meJames Marsden), Larry Underwood (GuardsJovan Adepo) and Nadine Cross (AquariusAmber Heard) – who are trying to build a new society, while at the same time fending off a threat from the sinister and supernatural villain Randall Flagg, played by Real bloodAlexander Skarsgard.
Although the show’s premiere falls on Thursday, December 17, this version is from The score – the second TV adaptation, after a 1994 miniseries starring Gary Sinise and Molly Ringwald – has been in the works since 2017, when CBS All Access programming chief Julie McNamara approached Cavell about a new project based on King’s novel.
“Even three years ago it felt like that was when The score was already awfully resonant, ”says Cavell. “We all began to question so many things that I had taken for granted – the fabric of human society, human civilization, American democracy. Those are the questions that are central The score. What would you do if you got a chance to hit the reset button on humanity? How would you rebuild? That was what prompted me. “
And while Cavell acknowledges that “real world events have given it a different kind of resonance,” he and Elmore hope viewers won’t be put off by the incendiary incident of a global health crisis. (“We are very true to the way the disease is portrayed in the book,” adds Cavell. “Captain Trips doesn’t feel like COVID. It doesn’t look like COVID.”)
“This is a terrible time for the world right now, and you don’t want to add to the misery,” admits Elmore. “But even though this story follows a similar territory, at least initially, it gradually becomes something completely different. It’s about who we are as people. “