Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire, or simply Interview with the Vampire, is an American gothic horror vampire television series created by Rolin Jones, based on the 1976 novel of the same name by Anne Rice. It stars Sam Reid as the vampire Lestat de Lioncourt, Jacob Anderson as his lover and protégé Louis de Pointe du Lac, and Eric Bogosian as the reporter Daniel Molloy. It was renewed for a second season in September 2022, ahead of its October 2, 2022 premiere on AMC. It has received critical acclaim.
Interview with the Vampire | |
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Genre |
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Created by | Rolin Jones |
Based on | The Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice |
Starring | |
Composer | Daniel Hart |
Country of origin | United States |
Original language | English |
No. of seasons | 1 |
No. of episodes | 2 |
Production | |
Executive producers |
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Producers |
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Production location | Louisiana |
Editor | Leo Trombetta |
Production companies |
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Distributor | AMC Networks |
Release | |
Original network | AMC |
Original release | October 2, 2022 (2022-10-02) – present (present) |
A sensuous, contemporary reinvention of Anne Rice's revolutionary gothic novel, Interview with the Vampire follows Louis de Pointe du Lac (Jacob Anderson), Lestat de Lioncourt (Sam Reid) and Claudia's (Bailey Bass) epic story of love, blood, and the perils of immortality, as told to journalist Daniel Molloy (Eric Bogosian). Chafing at the limitations of life as a black man in 1910s New Orleans, Louis finds it impossible to resist the rakish Lestat's offer of the ultimate escape: joining him as his vampire companion. But Louis's intoxicating new powers come with a violent price, and the introduction of Lestat's newest fledgling, the child vampire Claudia, soon sets them on a decades-long path of revenge and atonement.[1]
In the original novel and the 1994 film, Louis is an owner of a plantation in the Antebellum South and of the African slaves that work the land, and the homosexual elements of the novel are almost invisible in the film adaptation. In the TV series, Anderson portrays him as a closeted Creole black man whose wealth comes from a chain of brothels in Storyville, a now-subsumed red light district in early 20th century New Orleans.[2] The AV Club reviewer says "This reversal adds fascinating depths to Louis and allows Interview to grapple with prickly questions of race, sexuality, and history."[2] Writer Rolin Jones said that the changes were made in order to place the story in a “time period that was as exciting aesthetically as the 18th century was without digging into a plantation story that nobody really wanted to hear now”.[3]
No. | Title [4] | Directed by | Teleplay by [5] | Original release date [6] | U.S. viewers (millions) |
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1 | "In Throes of Increasing Wonder..." | Alan Taylor | Rolin Jones | October 2, 2022 (2022-10-02)[lower-alpha 1] | 0.662[8] |
2 | "...After the Phantoms of Your Former Self" | Alan Taylor | Jonathan Ceniceroz & Dave Harris | October 9, 2022 (2022-10-09)[lower-alpha 2] | TBD |
3 | "Is My Very Nature That of the Devil" | TBA | Rolin Jones & Hannah Moscovitch | October 16, 2022 (2022-10-16) | TBD |
4 | "...The Ruthless Pursuit of Blood with All a Child's Demanding" | TBA | Eleanor Burgess | October 23, 2022 (2022-10-23) | TBD |
5 | "A Vile Hunger for Your Hammering Heart" | TBA | Hannah Moscovitch | October 30, 2022 (2022-10-30) | TBD |
6 | "Like Angels Put in Hell by God" | TBA | Coline Abert | November 6, 2022 (2022-11-06) | TBD |
7 | "The Thing Lay Still" | TBA | Rolin Jones & Ben Philippe | November 13, 2022 (2022-11-13) | TBD |
A new franchise adaptation of Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles was initially in development as a film series at Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment. The novel series had previously been adapted into Interview with the Vampire starring Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt in 1994, and the less commercially successful 2002 sequel Queen of the Damned. Rice's son Christopher Rice had adapted the screenplay and Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci were set as producers.[9] The project paused until November 26, 2016, when Anne Rice had regained the rights to the franchise, with the intention to develop the novels into a television series, with Anne and Christopher Rice serving as executive producers of the potential series. Upon this announcement, Rice stated, "A television series of the highest quality is now my dream for Lestat, Louis, Armand, Marius, and the entire tribe. Though we had the pleasure of working with many fine people in connection with this plan, it did not work out. It is, more than ever, abundantly clear that television is where the vampires belong."[10]
On April 28, 2017, it was announced that Paramount Television Studios and Anonymous Content had optioned the rights after a competitive month-long bidding war. Christopher Rice was attached to rewrite the screenplay, with Anonymous Content's David Kanter and Steve Golin joining as executive producers.[11] On January 11, 2018, Bryan Fuller became showrunner, but quit later that month to not interfere with what the Rices were planning.[12][13] In a competitive situation, Hulu put the project in development on July 17, 2018, with Dee Johnson replacing Fuller as showrunner on February 19, 2019.[13][14] It was later announced on December 19, 2019, that Hulu had decided not to move forward with the project, with Rice adding her trilogy Lives of the Mayfair Witches, the rights to which were still owned by Warner Bros. Pictures, to the larger, complete rights package. Paramount Television was in a position to regain the rights to the novels as it was reported the studio was among the four bidders seeking the property.[15]
On May 13, 2020, it was announced that AMC Networks had purchased the rights to the intellectual property encompassing 18 novels and the possibility to develop feature films and television series from the deal.[16] On June 24, 2021, AMC gave an adaptation of the first novel in the series, Interview with the Vampire, a series order consisting of eight episodes, with the series scheduled to premiere in 2022. Rolin Jones was attached as creator, showrunner, and writer. Mark Johnson was named executive producer alongside Jones under their overall deals with AMC Studios, and oversee the universe for AMC.[17] On July 19, 2021, it was announced that Alan Taylor was attached to direct the first two episodes of the first season and to executive produce.[18] On September 28, 2022, ahead of the series premiere, AMC renewed Interview with the Vampire for a second season.[19]
In July 2022, Jones said that the series would embrace the gay subtext of Rice's original novel, in particular the sexuality and intimate relationship of Lestat and Louis. The 1994 film adaptation was criticized for excluding this element.[20]
In August 2021, it was announced that Sam Reid and Jacob Anderson were cast in the lead roles of Lestat de Lioncourt and Louis de Pointe du Lac.[21][22] In October 2021, it was reported that Bailey Bass joined cast in a starring role as Claudia,[23] and Kalyne Coleman would recur as Grace, Louis's sister.[24] In March 2022, it was announced that Assad Zaman was cast in a starring role as Rashid, while Eric Bogosian was cast as Daniel Molloy in an undisclosed capacity.[25][26] In April 2022, AMC announced the casting of Maura Grace Athari as Antoinette, a blues singer "whose relationship with Lestat disrupts our two vampires' domestic tranquility."[27]
Principal photography began in late 2021,[21] running from December to April 2022 in New Orleans.[28]
The series premiered on AMC on October 2, 2022 but was available three days earlier on AMC's sister streaming service AMC+.[29][30] Subsequent episodes will released on AMC+ one week prior to their cable premieres.[17][31]
The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a "Certified Fresh" 98% approval rating with an average rating of 8.55/10, based on 40 critic reviews. The website's critics consensus reads, "With a playful tone and an expansive sweep that allows Anne Rice's gothic opus to mull like a chalice of blood, Interview with the Vampire puts a stake through concerns that this story couldn't be successfully resurrected."[4] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned a score of 81 out of 100 based on 25 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[32]
No. | Title | Air date | Rating (18–49) | Viewers (millions) | DVR (18–49) | DVR viewers (millions) | Total (18–49) | Total viewers (millions) |
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1 | "In Throes of Increasing Wonder..." | October 2, 2022 | 0.2 | 0.662[8] | TBD | TBD | TBD | TBD |
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