Tragic ghost story inspires Mellencamp, King adaptation
LOS ANGELES — Not long after buying a rustic vacation cabin nearly two decades ago, Indiana rocker John Mellencamp was told by the previous owner that the cabin was haunted by the ghosts of two brothers and the girl they both loved, all of whom died horrifically there half a century earlier.
Most people would be content to relate that kind of story to friends, family members and neighbors, laugh it off and move on. Not Mellencamp. He called upon one man he knew would be able to grasp the full potential of the tragic tale: Stephen King.
The long-gestating result of that call surfaced this week in an all-star recording of the work that Mellencamp, King and superstar roots- music producer T Bone Burnett have been chipping away at for years: Ghost Brothers of Darkland County, a macabre tale brimming with sibling rivalry, jealousy, unresolved hatred and supernatural forces of evil.
The album is a complement to the staged version that played last year at the Alliance Theatre in Atlan- ta. It will go on the road to 20 cities in the Midwest and South this fall.
“It’s a great story, one that’s been with us ever since Cain and Abel,” said Mellencamp, who further connected with the theme of feuding brothers as the father of two boys. His older son Hud’s face is the album’s cover image.
In the work that was inspired by the real-life incident, the ghosts of brothers Jack and Andy, girlfriend Jenna and a caretaker haunt the cabin 40 years down the line when the youngest brother, Joe (voiced on the recording by Kris Kristofferson) returns as an adult with his wife and two sons.
Joe wants to face haunting childhood memories of the tragedy that resulted in the deaths of his beloved brothers and their girlfriend, hoping that in doing so he can stave off similar feuding between his own sons, Frank and Drake, voiced by country star Ryan Bingham and singer- songwriter Will Dailey. Sheryl Crow sings the part of Jenna.
The recording’s cast also includes Elvis Costello — gleefully inhabiting his role as the Beelzebub-like provocateur known only as “The Shape” — Neko Case, Rosanne Cash and, as the titular ghost brothers, Dave and Phil Alvin, co-founders of roots-rock group the Blasters.
For King, the album meant writing his first libretto. Mellencamp composed songs to establish and amplify fictional characters rather than, as he put it, “just saying what John Mellencamp has to say,” and Burnett stitched together the music to create “a ghost world of sound,” Mellencamp added.
Broadway may be in the “Ghost Brothers” future, although several aspects of this project go against the grain of contemporary Broadway practices: It’s not a jukebox musical stocked with well-established hit songs nor is it a sequel to any previously successful media property.
Noted Mellencamp, “When we first started doing it, we would have these read-throughs in New York, and we would invite Broadway people to come. They all wanted the happy ending. There’s no ... happy ending. ... In my favorite movies and books and songs, there’s no happy endings. Let’s face it: Life does not have a happy ending.”