All language subtitles for Interview.With.The.Vampire.S01E00.Behind.the.Scenes.Special.720p.WEB.h264-KOGi

This is Daniel Molloy.

It's 10:08 in the morning
on June 14, 2022.

So... Mr. Du Lac...

...how long have you been dead?

The year was 1910
in New Orleans.

I was being hunted.

And I was completely
unaware it was happening.

Please help me!

Anne Rice's vampires
are the most

human monsters in literature.

I'm such a fan
of Anne Rice's work,

of this world that she created.

So I put a lot of pressure
on myself

to fill Lestat's shoes,
which are mighty.

This is not a life!

That's 'cause you took my life!

There's one thing
I really want to do,

which is play a vampire.

They go, "No, you're
not gonna be a vampire.

They're talking about
you being the interviewer."

Do over.

The action, the period piece.
Be prepared to be wowed.

Let her go!

This is the show that
finally says vampires are real.

So, du Lac...
How long have you been dead?

On your mark.

We're making this show for AMC

based on Anne Rice's books,

starting, of course, with
Interview with the Vampire.

I've probably read it for the
first time about 20 years ago.

She satisfies on so many levels.

She's just damn
exciting to read.

She's scary as hell,
but the books

all deal with grand themes.

This show is a confluence
of Anne Rice and Rolin Jones,

which I think is a
really happy marriage.

I was doing an overall with AMC.

You come in and you have,
like, a nice meeting

with all the executives.

And on the way out,
one of them goes,

"And you know,
we're probably not gonna

be interested in this.

So, we bought all
the Anne Rice books,"

And I was, "Uh-uh-uh..."

Like, right at the door.
And then I came back

and I said,
"I really want to do this."

I'd always loved the book.

And I got a call to
meet with Rolin

and with Mark Johnson,
where we just talked about...

Anne Rice and vampires.

And we seemed to all be
on the same...

page about what
we were excited about.

Help me!

Help me please!

He's in my head, Father!

My excitement about the
original novel is still there.

The key thing for me
was that Anne Rice

managed to make you feel that

whatever else
you'd heard about vampires,

you were finally
getting the truth,

Finally hearing the real
story about vampirism.

I think she's really less
interested in the vam-powers

and more about the idea,

the burden of existence
and enduring.

And, um, what the accumulation
of loss and regret does to you.

And how do you pick yourself up?

There was a death of
her daughter that occurred

and, um, I think she wrote this
out of, uh, response to that.

And you can feel it
in all the pages,

woven in a depth of
feeling and loss and mourning.

That was the last sunrise
I ever saw.

Perhaps the kindest thing
the Dark Gift has given me.

Interview with the Vampire
starts with a mysterious man

explaining to a journalist
the story of his life.

This is Louis de Pointe du Lac

who's being interviewed
by Daniel Molloy.

And Louis tells the tale
of how a vampire named Lestat

came to New Orleans,
and turned him into a vampire.

They were your
brothers and sisters once,

but now they're
your savory inferiors.

I don't read this as
just the vampire novel,

and I didn't sell it
as a horror show.

Lestat has very
powerful feelings for Louis.

Their relationship is
the key to the whole thing,

and for better or worse,
because their relationship

is beautiful and ghastly.

So why are we
reimagining this story?

Well, I think like any great
piece of art, every generation

or every few generations,

uh, wants to reckon with it
in a new way.

This is a rigorous
and honest engagement

with the source material.

And the one thing you have to
know is you have to get down to

what is at the core
of these books,

and you cannot disrupt that.

I... I need to go home.

I've tried to always put
Anne in the room with us,

and the idea
when we would pivot,

we would just try to go,

well, try to imagine ourselves
in 1973 writing this book,

and now put that same
writer into 2020,

and you have a network
that says,

"Hey, make this
a television show."

The novel is out there.
Fans will always have the novel.

That movie in 1994,
very popular,

with a lot of people
always there.

AMC tasked me with
trying to make this third thing.

The year was 1910.

If you're gonna have
all this gothic romance

from the 18's, you're
going to move that out...

What's another sexy, exciting
time period for New Orleans?

It seemed very clear
to me that the next

really hot moment was
when jazz was coming up.

It's New Orleans.
It wasn't really hard to say,

"Why don't we make
Louis a Black Creole?"

We've kept all the plot.
It's all there.

But how we get to these
big plot points

are changed and are altered

by those two changes
that we fundamentally made.

Louis is the one that
takes you over the threshold

of telling you the
story of what it's like to...

to be human,

to have the feelings that we all
have about being human,

which was one
of the main stories

I wanted to be able to tell

was sort of
the initial stages by which

Louis is brought
into this new...

vampire life.

We take a little bit more time
with that because, you know,

the first episode is a lot about

what you give up
to become a vampire?

There's questions of...
of good and evil

dealing with alienation
and even loneliness,

even when you're with somebody.

And the more
you know the characters,

the more you feel for their
triumphs or their failures.

You think you know who you are

and coming out the other way
and go, "Who was I?"

That's what this show is about,
picking away at that.

Stay with us, stick with us.

You're going to see that
this is the show

that finally says
vampires are real.

It's a great Goddamn yarn,
is what it is.

First question:

You weren't always
a vampire, were you?

No.

I executive produced
a number of things for AMC

from Breaking Bad

to Better Call Saul to Rectify

andHalt and Catch Fire.

And if there's something
in common about all of them,

It's characters and
AMC embraces characters.

And that's what
Anne Rice has in spades.

We went out really
wide on all of these roles

and I kind of knew
as I was writing it,

that there might be an advantage
to London theater training.

It was particularly
difficult and compounded

because we were casting
in the age of, uh, the pandemic.

Where we were doing chemistry
reads on Zoom.

We're literally the
opposite sides of the world.

There's lots of
different time zones.

It was usually like
three o'clock in the morning

for me in Australia.

Some things you don't
get about America, Lestat!

Yes, let's have
this conversation again.

Rolin and I were in LA

in our office at six in
the morn... whatever it was,

just a very bizarre
way to go about things,

but it worked.

We got our guys.

Gentlemen, well,
you all know Louis du Lac.

Louis, let me introduce you
to Mr. Lestat de Lioncourt.

Lestat's come from Europe.
He's arrived in America

to try and live out
a full human life.

So he's come to New Orleans

to basically set up
his own kingdom.

He's here to live
the way he wants to live,

with music and sex and partying.

Freedom.

He's very arrogant,
he's very vain, he's brash.

He knows how to
behave in certain situations.

He knows how to purposely

misbehave in certain situations.

I mean, Lestat is
charming as hell, man.

Just somebody
you kind of want to

hang out with,
you know what I mean?

♪ Tired of this
And in the army ♪

♪ As a fighting man ♪

One thing I think that was
very important to everyone

was that this version of Lestat

isn't necessarily just
the version from the first book.

The Lestat in this book

is very different than
the Lestat in this book

and all the rest of the books
that go forward after that.

The idea of
the charming vampire,

uh, the brat prince,

does not exist in this book.

And, you know, Anne,
I think, had nine years

in between that book
and this book,

and it's very clear that

she sort of fell in love
with Lestat.

He is hotheaded and violent.

How can you humiliate
yourself like this?!

Excited about the challenge,
but also...

Terrified of what an undertaking

this was gonna be, to...

to live up to
Louis de Pointe du Lac.

Why we ended up with Jacob

was there was this
sort of seething humanity.

He was really kind.
You instantly liked him

because he's gonna make
a series of questionable

decisions along the way.

And so Louis comes from money
from the plantation

that was in this book.

His great grandfather
had that plantation

and it moved down,
third or fourth generation.

And this time period,
it was very difficult

to, um, be in the sugar business
if you were a Black man.

So he actually makes
this savvy move to go,

"Where can I
make money at this time?"

And what was good about this,

that there was still
sort of a gray area,

there was a moral
grayness to his work

that I think, um,
he has to confront.

You're a pimp.

The product was desired

and it came in as many forms

as there were ways to move.

I think Louis is very
confused about his identity.

He's somebody that wears...

many different hats.

And, you know,
he's trying to juggle

a family life, a business.

He's got his siblings,
his sexuality,

his race, his family history.

These things are all
kind of contributing to him

having a bit
of an identity crisis.

Go home. Yes, I'll bleed you
like a, bro.

Louis is quite
progressive for his time.

The way that he dresses, the
way that he presents himself.

The way that he thinks about
the world around him

is kind of steps ahead.

He just doesn't
quite belong in his time.

And I think that would be

a really attractive thing
for a vampire

because vampires don't either.

And I think that
Lestat sees that Louis

is almost like running
away from his humanity.

The first time
I laid eyes on you,

I saw that sorrow.

I can take away
that sorrow, Louis.

The irony being,
I think actually,

when he becomes
a vampire is when he starts

to reconnect to his humanity.

Claudia, she is brought in to
our story as she was in the novel,

as a kind of gift
from Lestat to Louis.

Louis has made
that heartbreaking realization

that he's going to
lose his family

because they're gonna age
and die and... and go away,

and he's never going
to have a family of his own.

And so Lestat make an
effort to create one for him.

Where's your mama?

The best thing in this book...

is Claudia.

Claudia is a 14-year-old girl,

and she gets
turned into a vampire

and then has to deal with
being stuck

for the rest of her life

as her mind matures
and she becomes a woman.

As Anne Rice wrote her,
she was a young child,

a five or six-year-old child.

I think aging Claudia
up is a super-smart decision.

For her being stuck at that age,

there's a lot of turmoil and...

how is she going to find
companionship

and how is she gonna grow?

You're stuck between
being an adolescent

and a child and adulthood.

She can never have a family.
She can never have babies.

So it's just absolutely
heartbreaking.

The beauty of Claudia,
she's a teenage girl,

but she also is a vampire.

That she still has crushes
and wants to stay out late.

When Claudia
first becomes a vampire,

everything's new to her
and exciting.

When she's going for
her first kill,

she's feeling everything,
and it's so euphoric.

She's not thinking
of what she's doing.

She's just like,
"I need to eat,"

because everything
is heightened for her

because she is 14.

I'm so hungry!

I think I'm gonna die!

They're essentially they're
just... a family of murderers.

So I think there's
something a little bit

uncomfortable about...

the whole situation, obviously,

but then I think
there is a real love.

What is funny, I suppose,
is the domestic nature

of three monsters trying
to live what they assume to be

a sort of normal existence.

No running, young lady.

The dynamic between them
is great. It's, uh...

Some of my favorite material
in this series

is the family and both
the loving moments

between them and the, uh,
hateful moments between them.

It's a way to
look at human behavior,

family behavior,
and just blow the lid off it.

When it came to who is
a journalist that has

the capability to push
a character

who's far more
powerful than him,

we couldn't be prouder
that is Eric Begozian,

who, uh, I think Rolin
would say was

who we always
had in mind for it.

The day before they called me
for this role,

I was thinking...

there's one thing that
I've yet to do

that's in my bucket list,
which is play a vampire.

So the next day, I get the call,
and I'm like, "Whoa, okay."

And I call them up,
they go, "No, that's...

You're not gonna be a vampire.

They're talking about you
being the interviewer."

I got to call you back.

We wanted to put a meatier,
more aggressive journalist

in the room to ask some
questions,

but we also, first and foremost,

wanted to revere
what Anne had made.

So we were like, "Oh, well,
what if it's the same guy?"

Now it's over 40 years later,

and Daniel has been
invited to interview again.

You've grown old, Daniel.

Yeah, well,
mortality beats a heavy drum.

He's got some
mileage on his treads.

And he's also not well.

You have
Parkinson's disease, Daniel?

Yeah.

This interview allows
him to go back

and maybe grab
the brass ring one last time.

Do over.

I have to keep in mind
that this guy almost killed me

40-something years ago.

He takes that fear
and he turns it into anger.

So the more scared he is,
the more angry he can get.

I'm not that kid
that you talked to

40-something years ago.

It's best we start when
our boy's had a rest.

I'm not your fucking boy.

I'm an old man with all
the triggers that come with it.

And I'm ready.

They met in San Francisco
in 1973.

I think they had...

This interview.

And I think 50 years later,

They're having this interview.

One of the delights
about doing this show

is that it's a love
letter to New Orleans

as much as to vampires.

And I think Anne Rice's,
um, affection for the city,

you know, informed her
take on the whole thing.

The interesting thing about
Anne Rice is...

not only was she
this huge literary figure,

but in the city of New Orleans,

she actually did a lot
for preservation,

just to maintain as much...

historical texture in
the city as she possibly could.

Often, Anne would go
to these places

and just spend time
just immersing herself

in these historic homes
and museums.

And it's in there.
Like, it's in the pages.

It's in the words.

We're shooting at Gallier house.

It's what Anne Rice wrote as
Lestat's house in the novels.

And so it's really
exciting to be able to

keep that connection
to the books.

This world, this universe,
and this character that Anne

created speaks directly
to the heart of this city.

We shot a scene the other day

where... it's actually
a direct quote of Anne Rice,

where Lestat
is talking about New Orleans,

and he says, "There's not
an inch of this city"

that wasn't built from
the fierce wilderness

that surrounds it.

New Orleans is very much
a part of

the romanticism
of Anne Rice's books.

It really
serves that kind of magical,

fantastical storytelling.

And it does feel like a
place where vampires live.

I produced
a number of big movies.

This is as big as any of those.

The production design,
it's breathtaking.

It is thorough, all the way
down to the very last detail.

We set it in a part of

New Orleans that
doesn't exist anymore.

Storyville was
the section that was

next to the French Quarter.
That was...

Uh, a wi... the wild section.

It was really one of the first
times in American history

where we had a really...
sort of a red light district,

And it was a rip-roaring time.

Storyville was a crazy social
experiment in New Orleans.

It started right at
the turn of the century,

and it was over by 1917.

And they allowed prostitution

in a very small
40-block square of the city.

When you walk onto these sets,

it's... it's as if you're
going into 1920's New Orleans.

Oh, it's much bigger
than I imagined it to be.

This is big in terms
of sets and our backlot,

which is a true backlot.

It's almost like the ones they
used to have in the studio lots

in the heyday of Hollywood.

There's a couple buildings
here that are exact replicas

of buildings that used to exist
on Basin Street in Storyville.

This is the exterior of our
Fairplay.

We had our great sculptor Brent

build the entablature
with a woman above,

and that's actually a detail
from a building in Storyville

that we found and reproduced.

We're actually
standing outside of

the stage set of
Lestat's townhouse.

It is an exact match
for our location

at 1132 Royal.

We replicated the fluted columns

with the Corinthian capitals,

and we had our sculptors
recreate the iconic iron doors

that are the
entryway to the vestibule.

So we're in Lestat's townhouse,

and we really wanted to avoid

some of the design cliche
of vampire

and get away from the burgundies
and the blacks

and the things that
we kind of historically

associate with vampires.

For me, it was really
important to have, like,

a vampire design aesthetic
and what it means to live in

a space that's
been curated by a vampire,

especially someone who
is as vivacious as Lestat is.

So this is the dining room.

Nothing good
ever happens in here,

Nothing... nothing
positive happens.

This has gotta be one of my
favorite rooms, actually.

And we wanted to pay
an homage to

vampire lore and filmmaking.

And so the candlestick
that gets pulled

and the... the bookcase opening.

So we wanted to have secret
panels for the coffin room.

So we needed a way to
open those secret panels.

And we designed that
into the mantle, the fireplace,

so that you activate
this little push button.

And then the built-in
wood panels of the bedroom,

which also have our
Art Nouveau embellishment

swing open and, um, it reveals
the coffin room inside.

Claudia's room, we actually
do the gag with the lamp,

where you twist the lamp.

In her bed is actually
a Lazy Susan

that turns around
and there is a coffin inside.

Trying to use vampire logic
of what I'd want

in my secret coffin room
and that would be...

"How do you know
if it's daylight outside?"

And so we added
these beautiful...

uh, reproduction nouveau
peephole so that we could

open them and see if
it was sunny out or not.

She's so considerate
of what we might need,

what we might be looking at,

what we might want to touch.

There's always something
tangible about way she designed it.

But inside these boxes,

there are tons and
tons of incredible items.

This is the amount of detail
that was in the show.

The original Fairplay matches.

And it becomes the Azalea.

Security equipment
for the penthouse of du Lac.

That's the only chess set.

Is this the one that
I threw across the room?

Yeah, and it surprisingly
didn't break.

So this is just
a box of voodoo dolls.

This scared the...
out of me, this one.

It's... Sometimes it's
just better to not know.

It has been
so grand and so epic.

So many big scenes
with so many people.

And we've got a lot
of amazing real period clothing

that is coming from all over.

But because our leads
are vampires,

they're rough on their clothes.

So many dresses made,

so many suits made,
all of their shoes.

We make a lot.

We really kind of turned up

the color for Louis.

And when you meet him in this,

and he pops out in this gold
and... it's just beautiful.

I get out of the car
and people would be like,

"Damn! Ooh! Look at the suit."

Like, people, were ju... like,
were going crazy over my suits.

The costume helps
the actor in so many ways.

So one of the things
that was a real challenge

was making sure that every
single detail was just right.

And I've spent months
researching so that you

really feel you're in that time,

and then your characters

can be who they
need to be on top of it.

Lestat really is
a man from the 1700s.

So in terms of the costume,
when we first meet him,

he's still wearing
elements of that.

This was a coat that we designed
for him to land in

and, um, a lot of texture
and a lot of wear there,

and a little bit of elegance
in that lining,

you know, when you get
a pop of that,

it's like, "Oh."

Carol has done
an extraordinary job

of really keeping the
elements of bondage in his costume.

So I think they're really fun
to walk around in.

The red cloak that I wear
was definitely, like,

I remember walking outside
and everyone was like,

"Holy cow." And I was like,
"I know, right? It's so great."

When people see the show,
they're going to really flip out

and fall in love
with every aspect of it

and the way it looks
and the way it sounds.

The music alone is amazing.

And the acting and the costumes,

the hair, and the makeup
and the production design,

everything about it,
it feels authentic.

And you buy the universe 100%.

It's as if I'd walked my
entire life as a dead man.

I know that I've always
loved vampires as characters,

as creatures who've
scared me from...

I remember at an early age

reading Bram Stoker,

there's something so...

sort of deliciously
scary about them.

I think people really love,
just, vampires

and vampire stories because...

it shows us
the dark nature of ourselves.

It's like this funhouse-mirror
reflection

on our own mortal lives and
things that we all think about.

Everyone feels
like they sort of know

the vampire mythology,
but there's a lot of variation.

We look at Nosferatu.

We look at
Bela Lugosi's Dracula.

You know,
Frank Mangella'sDracula.

So many different
versions of vampires.

But I think what's different
about Anne Rice

than a lot of
other vampire things

is the humanity of it all.

In terms of
the look of our vampires,

we made decisions earlier on,
which are

right out of
the Anne Rice mythology.

That, you know,
they are not monstrous,

they're not terrifying
to look at.

Their look is sort of
a heightened human beauty.

I don't want to make them pale.

I don't want to make them veiny.

I don't want to give
them a crazy forehead,

Because how would they
integrate into the real world?

Everybody would be
running away from them.

But instead,
we went the other way

and made him look
perfect in every way.

Well, the eyes are described,

you know, very beautifully
in the novels,

and... and we've been very true

to the descriptions
that we were given.

Each of our vampires has special
contact lenses that they wear,

and they each
have their own color.

Louis, he has these
bright green eyes.

Lestat, his eyes
are a beautiful pale gray.

And Claudia has these amber
orange eyes that, like, pop.

When I looked in the mirror,
I saw my lenses.

I can creep people out.
Like, I have that power.

And they have different contact
lenses for different moods

and different, uh, levels of
arousal and ferocity.

When they attack,
their pupils dilate

really big, so we have
separate contacts for that.

People look at you
funny, and you're like,

"Why are people
looking at me like this?"

And you forget that you haven't
blinked for four minutes

because there's no air going
into your eyes.

Well, one of the things we're
doing differently in the show

is that the vampires
don't always have their fangs,

and it depends on their mood.

So we have, like, what
we call resting fangs.

We have attack fangs.

We have a lot
of different fangs.

We made hundreds and hundreds
of teeth for these guys.

There's three different lengths,

and there are slip-on caps
that click in.

So obviously,
when they're about to eat,

that's when their fangs appear.

And that will be a combination
of us and digital effects.

Claudia has four fangs,
and the standard is two.

Our tongues are not
used to wearing things,

so that was
a little bit awkward.

It took a while to practice
learning how to speak

with a full set of dentures.

Claudia, Lestat and Louis,
we have a set of

full bridges for attack mode.

Where are your
parents at this hour?

Claudia! No, don't!

The fingernails have a big part
of the Anne Rice lore. Um...

And the way they're described,
there's a sheen to them.

They're... they're extended,
they're slightly pointed.

They're also useful as weapons,
uh, but they're beautiful.

We didn't want claws on them.
We wanted very slight...

but yet they looked
like they were razor-sharp.

The nails are really fun,
especially for Claudia.

One of the scenes
is admiring her nails.

So even the way Claudia kills,

I always like to
remember the nails.

Like, "These are my nails,
I'm going to kill with these."

You're wondering if your nails

would be like that forever,

and the answer is yes.

I'll tell you,
the biggest struggle

is keeping the nails on.

First brought in somebody
to do all their nails,

like, once a week,
but then nails would fall off,

and then we'd have to
glue them on on-set.

Jacob, he has
these press-on nails,

whereas Sam, he's
agreed to get acrylics made.

We have a nail person,
a specialist, come in

and do acrylic nails on
him and also on Bailey.

The only reason

I don't wear the acrylic nails

is because I have
a... a young daughter,

and I have to change her nappy
and give her cuddles,

and I don't want her to...
want to scratch her.

We put them through a lot,
you know?

Having sticky blood on you
is a horrible thing.

I mean, imagine if you just
covered yourself

in honey all day long.

So we had gallons
and gallons and gallons

of vampire blood,
dressing blood,

mouth blood, gel blood,
the whole thing.

And then we had all the
human blood,

which we spilled
all over the place.

Tons and tons of blood.

And then we also had these
big giant puddles of blood

that were synthetic,
just like mats, like a doormat,

but they're in the shape of
a giant puddle.

And we had all different sizes.

Like, right down here is...

is our blood kit
that we carry to set.

And we have different
kinds of blood, like gel blood,

which is just kind of a solid
blood, some low-light blood,

so it's like, because
we're in the dark a lot.

This is pumping blood.
So I usually hook up a tube,

Then...

Yeah, there's a lot of blood
in the show.

They're actually cocktailing
something right now

that we're going
to use in Episode Seven,

and we're actually
going to be drinking it,

and we're taste testing it...

to make sure we like it.

And there's, like,
hibiscus in it,

but it looks like blood.

The drinkable blood
is very sugary,

so you get this kind of,
like, high from it,

which is probably
not as intense a high

as vampires get from
drinking real blood,

but there's something.

Ah-uh-uh-uh-uh.

We live off the blood
of the living.

Out the back, I have a...
fire extinguisher loaded

with blood, so I hook
that up to my hoses.

Great.

That's probably two gallons
worth of blood right there.

And then we'd
go crazy and just, like,

Kill Bill it over the place.

We wanted it to be, like, boom!

One of the, um, things we
had to be concerned about

is that we were
shooting in locations

that are like, 150 years old
in New Orleans.

There's a sequence
in Episode One,

we just annihilate
a bunch of people in there.

And we're shooting in this
church and I'm like,

"Okay, we've got to be really,
really careful."

The second the blood
hit the floor,

we finished shooting it,
we cleaned it right up.

It's no easy feat acting
with fake blood in your mouth

and fake teeth that you
can't chomp down on

and with contact lenses
where you can barely see,

and then have to deliver
a beautiful,

heartfelt performance.

- This is not a life!
- That's 'cause you took my life!

The cast never complained
about it,

and they always took it on
beautifully because

they all saw... special.

And makes the show
that much more,

um, exciting to watch.

Cut!

The beauty of
Anne Rice's characters

is that they aren't creatures.

They are us.
They feel the same way we do,

and they don't quite know
where they belong in the world.

I think that a lot of alienated
people can identify with that.

It's really empathetic
and says it's okay to be

a little bit different.

It's okay to
be feared by others.

It's okay to have
these questions about yourself.

I think there was
a very big female population.

I think there's a very big
LGBT population who really...

captured from the
book this feeling

that there wasn't
a judgment for people

who had feelings for one
another who are of the same sex.

She really had
an impact on my life.

It was the first...

Queer book... mainstream book...
that I had read,

and I remember reading
it and being so surprised by it.

I was like 15, and I was like,
"Oh, my gosh, they're,"

you know, "in love."

And that was a very
big deal to me,

And I'm very glad to
be a part of this show.

We're all in love
with Anne Rice's stories

and the questions that
she asks in her books

and through her characters.

Why do you do this, Lestat?

Well, I like to do it.
I enjoy it.

Well, I don't!

It feels like holding
this kind of

very precious thing every day.

You know, Anne passed away
while we were shooting this.

When we found out
that Anne Rice passed away,

it was certainly something

that all of us immediately felt,

and the mood the next
day feeling particularly heavy.

I think especially for
the city of New Orleans.

She is an icon here,

and... and this city has
a lot to thank her for.

It's a great tragedy.
It's a huge literary loss.

I actually went down
to the Garden District bookshop

that day and went and
spoke to people

who knew her and, you know,

who often threw
her book openings

and went through their
old photographs...

of Anne Rice turning up
to her book signings

and book openings in a coffin,
in a bridal dress.

And...

This was an extraordinary person

who made a huge impact
on a lot of people's lives.

I would have liked to
have thanked her because

when I read
Interview with the Vampire,

I felt understood on some level.

I felt spoken to, I felt...

I felt, um, comforted
by how she writes.

On the morning of
our next shoot day,

Rolin read a really
beautiful passage

from the beginning of the book

and really spoke to the
legacy that she has built.

I think we carry it,
that legacy, as a great...

responsibility and
with a huge amount of respect.

She's the reason that we're here

getting to tell
this beautiful story.

It really was a
wonderful moment for everyone

to come together
and pay respect to her.

The thing that felt
different after that was

you really got a sense then

that it was on us after that.

She wasn't going to be able to
write any more, any more words.

So the canon is now set.

And for her to not be
able to see all of these

wonderful characters
come to life again,

I think is something
that really sits with all of us.

And something that we feel
even more of

a responsibility over,

creating something
that hopefully

the fans and people who
appreciate her

will continue to do so.

I think every author
loves their writing first.

If a movie or TV show
gets people to go back

and look at it again, that's
as honored as you can get.

So I think it's certainly, uh...

It would be something that
would make her happy to think

that a really nice
manifestation of her books

will get people
to go back to her books.

I think she was a
significant American writer,

And I think she has a
bunch of people out there who...

This book is the book for them.

This thing means
the world to them.

And I think, um, there's
a couple of generations

that don't know it like that.
And we're hoping that...

That'll happen again.

We're making this show
for a lot of people

who've never read Anne Rice,

perhaps have never even
heard of Anne Rice.

So it has to satisfy them.

But most importantly,
there are the readers.

You have to get the core right.

The spirit of the books
has to be true,

and I believe...

I believe we got it right.

I think fans should be
most excited about

diving into the Anne Rice
world and this amazing,

beautiful world that Rolin
has created,

um, in this adaptation.

I wasn't sure you remembered me.

Your book makes no
mention of our prior meeting.

What I would say to
fellow Anne Rice fans

is to trust us
because we all love her, too,

and stick with us.

The thread of her storytelling
is all the way through it.

People who have
read these books closely,

I think will quite quickly
figure out how much love

and how much reverence
we had for this book.

You mentioned vampires
and one of those,

readers tend to call bullshit.

Have I hit a nerve?

We are going to have
a number of Easter eggs.

Some pretty obvious,

some only the keen viewer
will be aware of.

I came to know
Christ in a monastery.

I wanted to be a priest.

There are other,
you know, Easter eggs

connecting to other books
and other vampires.

There's a character
from Queen of the Damned

that makes an appearance here.

The nice thing about
how AMC is doing this

is there a few story threads

from Anne Rice's world
rising at the same time.

So in
Interview with the Vampire,

we get to make a few references

to the witches who are literally

just down the block in
our story.

Plenty of brooms down the street
at the Mayfair Sisters' home.

He's calling me a witch, Momo.

The Immortal Universe is
a description of some of

Anne Rice's books with

interwoven
and connected characters.

We obviously have
Interview with the Vampire,

and on the heels of it,
is The Mayfair Witches.

And that is starring
Alexandra DiDario.

It's a story about a woman,
a doctor, in San Francisco,

who discovers that
she's the 13th Witch

in a line of New Orlean witches

And comes to New Orleans
and has to deal with

these desperate
influences on her life.

And we will develop beyond that.

Interview with the Vampire,
Season One, is such a wild ride.

There's romance,
there's backstabbing,

there's killing.

We have amazing stunt sequences.

You get a little
bit of everything.

And there are some
very funny moments as well.

I'm a person who very much
believes that all drama

should have comedy and all
comedy should have drama.

And I... What I always say is

somewhere in the middle,
humanity lies.

But I think the humor
is in Anne Rice as well.

It's extreme stuff and these
are extreme feelings

that they're feeling.

You know, it's gallows humor.

You have to find...
the macabre funny.

If we didn't laugh,

we'd all be screwed, really.

It's compelling
and it's humanity

and it's... and it's beautiful.

And I think
that that's what people

will be watching, uh,
as they kill many...

many, many people.

Whenever you ready, Louis.

When you see this,
this will be your new

Interview with the Vampire.

Like, you'll get it
and you'll be like,

there is no other
Interview with the Vampire.

There's this version
and that's that.

He's dead.

Yes, there is a lot of blood,

Yes, there are a lot of

really gross horror movie
classic tropes,

But there's a beating
heart to this show.

That is the greatest part
about this show.

They're vampires. The emotions
get wider and wider and wider.

One of the most
satisfying moments

for a producer
just standing back

and just saying, "Oh, my God,

I had something to do
with putting this together."

And you just beam with pride.

And this happened
a lot on this show.

There's his mark.

So I really hope that
the fans of... of these books

and this world really
see that we are

bringing in all of the elements

and that we can do them honestly

and truthfully and as
blatantly as she wanted.

I'm really excited
for people to see it.

And there's nothi...
I don't think there's anything else

like this show.