A Man in Full Is Concrete Proof of How Unadaptable Tom Wolfe Really Is

Summary:

• A Man in Full has recently dethroned Baby Reindeer from the top of Netflix ’s charts, however it hasn’t been as highly acclaimed.
• Standing with 43% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, the show is deemed to be a flop.
• No Tom Wolfe adaptation so far managed to turn out both critical and commercial success.

While there are some directors who love the challenge and try to adapt the most difficult novels, not many of them succeed. When writing a story down, the author relies largely on their own descriptions and the reader's imagination to complete the picture. With the imagination factor taken out, it's up to the crew behind the movie to think through the details.

Though many great works of literature have been adapted into screenplays, there are some authors who haven't been so lucky as to get even one successful adaptation. The recent Netflix flop, A Man in Full, puts Tom Wolfe on this list.

Tom Wolfe Adaptations Rating

In addition to A Man in Full, there have been three other attempts to adapt Tom Wolfe's writings. In 1973, the sports drama The Last American Hero was released, based on Wolfe's essay about race car driver Junior Johnson. 10 years later, Philip Kaufman wrote and directed The Right Stuff, and in 1990, The Bonfire of the Vanities was released.

Of all these attempts, only one was critically acclaimed. The Right Stuff received a 96% rating from critics and a 90% rating from audiences, but it still failed to attract audiences to theaters. The sci-fi story of the seven military pilots selected as astronauts for Project Mercury ended up being a major box office flop.

With a budget of $27 million, the film only managed to make $21 million at the box office. The other two attempts weren't much better. The Last American Hero had a budget of $2 million against a box office of $1 million, and The Bonfire of the Vanities cost $47 million but only made a little over $15 million.

Both films also failed to impress audiences and critics. The Bonfire of the Vanities has been trashed by reviews and still stands with only 15% on Rotten Tomatoes, while The Last American Hero has gotten better scores from critics, but fell flat with casual viewers.

When they started working on A Man in Full, both Netflix executives and the show's creator, David E. Kelley, must have been aware of the fate of previous Wolfe adaptations. Nevertheless, they couldn't escape the curse and ended up in the same list of failed attempts with a Rotten Tomatoes score of 43%.

However, if you want to see A Man in Full and judge for yourself, you can stream the show starring Jeff Daniels and Diane Lane on Netflix.