F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby is often hailed as the great American novel that features a distorted view of the American dream. The central character, Jay Gatsby, begins his life in obscure poverty and soon becomes an enigmatic figure surrounded by immense wealth.
Audiences have loved The Great Gatsby for almost a hundred years as it’s easy to relate to the central themes of trying to relive the glory of the past and suffering the consequences of in the present. It’s a timeless classic that is relatable to all generations.
Ultimately, this makes it the perfect choice for an adaptation. Since the creation of The Great Gatsby in 1925, there have been numerous adaptations and references including stage plays, feature-length films and even a long-lost NES video game.
It’s evident that this little 208-page book has clearly surpassed its original medium and entered mainstream culture.
A silver screen classic
A year after the release of the book, Herbert Brenon directed the first-ever movie adaptation of the book. Whilst this film gathered mediocre reviews and was hated by the author, the film set the benchmark for the first of many different movie adaptations.
It would take almost 23 years before another adaptation would be attempted with Elliot Nugent’s The Great Gatsby (1949). The book even warranted a Francis Ford Coppola adaptation in 1974 starring Hollywood legends Robert Redford and Mia Farrow.
However, the most memorable and popular adaptation was easily Baz Luhrmann’s The Great Gatsby (2013) starring Leonardo DiCaprio as Gatsby. This film conveyed the glitz and glamour of the book as well as the corrupted American dream. Not only was this film a hit with audiences, but critics as well and won multiple awards such as an Academy Award and BAFTA.
The Great Gatsby even has an animated movie in development from William Joyce which will be the first-ever animated feature-length film based on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel. Evidently, as The Great Gatsby novel can relate to different generations of audiences, there is always a gap in the market for a movie adaptation.
Television gold
The silver screen isn’t the only medium that has used the novel as inspiration. During the golden age of television in the 1950s, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s story was adapted for the first time on television with NBC’s Robert Montgomery Presents. The show was incredibly popular and provided a new medium of television with an hour-long drama.
In more recent times, A&E developed a television movie with The Great Gatsby (2000) starring Toby Stephens, Mira Sorvino and Paul Rudd. It’s worth mentioning that whilst there haven’t been any recent direct television adaptations of The Great Gatsby, many shows have been inspired by the time period and the subject matter with examples such as Boardwalk Empire, Cable Girls and Flowers in the Attic to name just a few.
Despite multiple screen adaptations, there are still creators that wish to explore the story even further. The creator of period dramas such as Vikings and The Tudors, Michael Hirst, has expressed an interest in developing a new mini-series but with a modern focus on gender, race and sexual orientation.
In popular culture
Of course, not all the adaptations for The Great Gatsby have been on television or movies as the first-ever retellings of the story were on the stage. There have even been many books influenced by the original story with both prequels and sequels with Michael Farris Smith’s Nick and AJ Odasso’s The Pursued and the Pursuing.
Amazingly, there have even been three graphics novels with the first being created by Nicki Greenberg and the latest from K. Woodman-Maynard. The most inventive reworking of the story has to be the online slot The Great Pigsby Megapays which follows the story but the characters are replaced by anthropomorphic pigs instead.
Within the world of gaming, there have been a handful of games inspired by the book with the first being the 2010 hidden object game called Classic Adventures: The Great Gatsby. The book even has an 8-bit game created for the NES created by Charlie Hoey aptly called The Great Gatsby.
The film finally entered the public domain in 2021, so the possibilities are literally endless for The Great Gatsby. Within the next few years, it’s expected that there will be even more retellings of the famous story as there is no limit as to where it can go. They say you can’t repeat the past, but we’re certain that the successful adaptations of The Great Gatsby will continue to prosper for another hundred years.
