Joe Hill Is Bringing One of His Unpublished Stories to the Big Screen for a Personal Reason

Stephen King’s son Joe Hill has carved out his own space in horror and genre storytelling, not only through his novels and comics, but also through a strong presence in film and television.

Hill keeps a steady pace of writing one screenplay a year, sometimes pulling from his own stories and sometimes adapting the work of others. His next project comes from his own vault and it carries a meaningful purpose behind it.

In a recent conversation with Mashable, Hill explained that he is preparing a feature adaptation of an unpublished novella he wrote. He shared, "Right now I'm revising a screenplay that I was paid for for 2025. The script I'm working on now is an adaptation of an unpublished novella that I'd written that will be published eventually."

Details about the story itself are still under wraps, but fans can expect something eerie and emotional in the spirit of his previous adaptations. Horror audiences will remember that The Black Phone came from one of Hill’s short stories and was brought to life by director Scott Derrickson.

Netflix’s In the Tall Grass also originated from Hill, and the fan favorite series Locke and Key grew from his comic of the same name.

This time, though, the motivation behind the project is rooted in something very real. Hill opened up about why he consistently writes a screenplay each year, explaining that he does it partly to maintain healthcare through the Writers Guild of America.

He said he is only eligible if he meets yearly writing requirements. As he put it, "a screenplay every single year" is "for the healthcare." He added, "It's so important to have access to that healthcare insurance," sharing that his wife received a cancer diagnosis in 2024.

That health scare pushed Hill to take action when a lapse in coverage appeared on the horizon. He turned to Derrickson for support, and the collaboration sparked the new adaptation.

Hill said, "I sent him this novella I had written that hadn't been published, and a pitch for how I'd adapt it, and he got psyched. And he's like, 'We gotta do this.' And so he got me the gig to write the script. Now I'm revising it for Sony Screen Gems."

Hill’s wife has since fully recovered, but the writer intends to keep this rhythm in his career. Alongside his novels, he plans to continue delivering one screenplay a year throughout his fifties.

Looking ahead, he revealed, "The next two things I've got lined up are adaptations of other people's words, which I'm really excited about."

For fans of his storytelling and anyone who has followed his path from novels to screens big and small, this new film promises something special, drawn not only from Hill’s imagination but from a moment that shaped his life in a profound way.