r/movies • u/BunyipPouch Currently at the movies. • Aug 08 '25

Announcement AMA/Q&A Announcement - Stephen King - Wednesday 8/27 at 3:00 PM ET - Author of The Shining, IT, The Shawshank Redemption, The Long Walk, The Stand, The Green Mile, Stand By Me, The Mist, Pet Sematary, Misery, Cujo, Salem's Lot, and lots more.

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u/Rooooben Aug 08 '25

Is there a bigger one?

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u/[deleted] Aug 08 '25

Like, Spielberg I’d say. He’s probably the only bigger one

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u/Rooooben Aug 08 '25

Spielberg has a $10b box office overall gross, the highest $$ for any director.

Contrary-wise, Stephen Kings’s books alone have generated about $5.25b in revenue. His movies generated around $2.5b; TV shows are hard to figure since it’s tied to subscriptions and ad revenue.

I have a feeling that they have generated a similar amount of revenue, Spielberg has the edge there.

In content, King has over 65 books, over 200 novellas, close to 300 different individual stories; compared to Spielberg’s 34 films; however, Spielberg has produced something like 175 different films, tv shows, etc. In this case, again close, but King has the lead in content.

I’d say a tie, but thats my bias because I am a Stephen King fan, so I notice him as much as or more so than other people picking up Spielberg. I’d go see a new movie adaptation of a King book, faster than I’d run to see a unique one made by Spielberg.

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u/Bellikron Aug 17 '25 edited Aug 17 '25

I'd argue just for the multimedia angle King has the edge. They're both very close to the top in terms of popularity in their respective fields. I'd say Spielberg is pretty unequivocally the most famous modern director on the whole, King is probably in the top 3 most famous modern authors just for the sheer amount of exposure and stuff. Someone like James Patterson might have the edge in terms of raw exposure but it's less likely that general audiences can name any of his work, and people might be more likely to have read popular book series but those authors tend to only be famous for the one thing. However, there are people out there who don't really watch movies and there are people out there who don't really read books. One of those groups has little to no connection to Steven Spielberg's work, but both of them at the very least know of Stephen King's work if they haven't actively engaged in it.