Shepard Fairey Bringing ’1984′ Back to the Big Screen
Shepard Fairey came to prominence when he merged his meme “Andre the Giant has a Posse” with one of the most memorable elements of John Carpenter’s ‘They Live’: the subliminal advertising that told humans to “Obey.” So it seems fitting that Fairey has brought a new adaptation of George Orwell’s ’1984′ to Imagine Entertainment, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
There have been two previous filmed adaptations of 1984, with the most famous being done in 1984. It will be interesting to see if they keep the name, and the original setting – Orwell wrote the book in 1948, and just switched the last two numbers of the current year. We’ve obviously passed the time it was set in, but the themes of the book about a controlling government are evergreen.
From all evidence, Fairey’s involvement as a producer is minor, though he’s teaming with Imagine entertainment, which is run by Ron Howard and Brian Grazer. Fairey’s most famous recent work includes Obama’s ‘Hope’ poster – which always had a tinge of irony to it for those who knew him for his ‘Obey’ art. The idea of using ‘Obey’ as a slogan was done partly to spread Carpenter’s message in ‘They Live’ that the mass media was using advertising to keep people docile, and Fairey’s work has often used agitprop as its basis.
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