Interview with the Vampire

Review by Mike Finkelstein

I love a good vampire story. There’s something about vampires, a scary and sultry allure, that they have over other classic monsters. While people can find vampires frightening, they can also find them attractive, sexy, interesting. It takes someone with a particular kind of kink to find werewolves sexy, and no one is going to accuse Frankenstein’s creation of being a lady killer (well, unless they’re literally saying he killed a lady). But vampires have this magic about them that is unlike any other creature, and it makes them far more interesting to watch.

Interview with the Vampire, the 2022 AMC+ series based on the Anne Rice novel of the same name, knows exactly the kind of allure vampires can have. It makes no bones about the fact that vampires can be sexy as well as scary, casting very pretty men in the lead roles for the show and then letting them charge the screen with their dynamic charisma and sexual tension. It’s a show that knows how to tap into what Anne Rice was aiming for with her novels, letting these vampires be very bold and very gay.

I appreciate that the series is far more willing to embrace this side of the relationship between the main characters, Louis de Pointe du Lac (Jacob Anderson) and Lestat de Lioncourt (Sam Reid), than the 1994 film version. That movie was able to tap into the adversarial nature of the relationship, with Louis feeling trapped into an eternity Lestat forced upon him, but it missed the romance, the lovers’ bond between the two that is a key dynamic of the pairing. Without that, the actions between the characters feel different, less two lovers sharing eternity together and more like a master and a pet, with Louis very much the pet.

Not that there aren’t aspects of that in the TV series as well. The show hits upon the major beats of the books, while also fleshing out scenes, adding context from later books, and even getting to work in some of its own creative flourishes. But the meat of the story, the expected throughline that the TV shows inherits from the original novel, is maintained, and in that story Lestat was an abusive master as well as a loving partner, and it created for a controlling, hateful dynamic at times between the two.

Naturally, if you’ve read the book or seen the 1994 movie then you’ll know the main plot points of the story. Louis (Anderson), a New Orleans businessman working in the French Quarter around the turn of the century, meets Lestat de Lioncourt (Reid) during one of his nightly excursions. Lestat draws his eye like no other man has before (and Louis is a closeted gay man so plenty of men have drawn his eye), and the two quickly fall for each other. But Lestat has a secret that, eventually, he reveals to Louis: he’s not just a very pretty man, he’s also a vampire. This presents Louis with a choice, continue to live in the closet or embrace being a vampire, and being gay, with Lestat.

He chooses to become a vampire, and over the next couple of decades the two live together while amassing something of a business empire in the Quarter. However, this does not give Louis the true happiness he craves. His family disowned him sometime after he became a vampire, not because they knew he was a monster but because he was different (and his mother also blamed him for his brother’s death, which happened before he turned into the undead). Louis wants to fill that void, to have a family again, and Lestat isn’t the one that can handle that. So when Louis finds a dying teenage girl, he has Lestat turn her. This girl, Claudia (Bailey Bass in season one, Delainey Hayles in season two) then becomes their surrogate daughter, living and hunting with them. But the relationship with Lestat is still strained, the anger is still brewing, and things are going to come to a head in a very brutal and bloody way…

That summary only covers about half the story, which is also the meat of the first season. It also doesn’t cover many more of the flourishes the series adds in. For one, the TV series makes Louis black. This adds another layer of context to his character, and creates more tension for him in his vampire life. He now has all this power, more than any mortal man, but to the outside world he’s still just a colored man, and is looked down upon by his white “betters” in high society. His rage at this is what pushes him to build his business empire, but it’s also what sets off a series of violent setbacks between him and the whites of the Quarter, adding more fire and violence and rage.

Meanwhile, Claudia is aged up in this adaptation. Instead of being a very young girl, around eight-years-old, in the original story, she’s closer to 14 here in the TV series. This likely was done so that the more mature themes for the character, like her growing into adulthood as a vampire while her body remains tiny, or her desire for sex and connection, would work better for her character without it seeming extremely gross. The characters still comment on it, and we still have to view her as younger and not adult for her 30 or so years of life on the series, but it does smooth over things some (especially since both actresses that played the character are in their early twenties, smoothing that over even more).

It’s the acting, though, that really brings this series to life. The dynamic between Louis and Lestat, between Anderson and Reid, is palpable. It’s kinetic, fiery, like lightning caught between them. They can share a glance and melt audiences into goo. But that fire also works when they’re fighting, creating rage and brimstone and throwing it around with such dynamism. These two give the show life and make it so very interesting to watch. Of the two actresses to play Claudia, I do like Bass over Hayles, although I think they’re both good in the role. Bass had better chemistry with the leads, and I felt her interpretation of Claudia was more interesting, in part because she got to grow the character and find her inner monster. Hayles is solid but her version feels less organic and more like a copy, just carrying on the role that she didn’t get to start herself. Some bit of spark is missing.

The production values on the series are also fantastic, with the French Quarter of the early 1900s feeling lived in and very real. As the film moves forward along the timeline, jumping to new time periods and then, in the second season, even moving over to Europe, the quality of the production holds steady. Everything is very handsome, with lovely sets and very strong costuming work. This shouldn’t surprise anyone as AMC has been making solid period pieces for a couple of decades now (just look over at Mad Men for a solid example). This is a show that works as a feast for the eyes, as well as a delight from a storytelling perspective.

And, delightfully, it is very violent and gory. The series doesn’t shy away from showing the vampires as monsters, with their need to hunt and kill given all the glory it deserves. These are predators, hunters, creatures higher up on the food chain, and the show delights in giving us the ugly, gory thrills we want from time to time. In particular there’s a scene in the second season, when a whole coven of vampires goes off to kill a mansion full of rich assholes, as the series not only, gives you all the gore and violence you want, but also manages to display it in a funny context, making it work even better. The series knows exactly what it is, and it revels in it.

Honestly, anyone that is a fan of vampires should absolutely enjoy Interview with the Vampire. This 2022 version taps into all the thrills and delights from the book, while fleshing things out even more to give fans a more complete and detailed experience. Not ever fan of the book will like this work just because it does have deviations here or there, but as long as you’re not a steadfast purist this is probably the best adaptation of Anne Rice’s vampire series we could ever expect to get.

Season 1

This first season covers the early relationship between Louis and Lestat, from before they meet and Louis is dealing with his business life, the marriage of his sister, and the death of his brother, to them coming together. The two form their relationship, even while Louis loses his family, and then he throws himself into his work to find a way to fill the void. Claudia is then introduced, and while her addition gives Louis some comfort, it adds strain to the relationship with Lestat. Things then turn violent, again and again, as that strain grows to become too much. And then it all takes a very violent and bloody turn to cap the season, leaving you wanting more.

It's a more faithful adaptation, sticking far closer to the details of the book. Sure, some details are changed, like Louis being a black man running businesses in the seedier parts of the French Quarter instead of being a white plantation owner, but generally the series hews closely to the major points of Rice’s book. That goes right up to the violent and bloody season finale that fans of the story know to expect.

The best part of this first season is that it leaves you wanting more. It’s so well made and well acted that you get invested in the world and the characters. You want to see what happens to them where they end up next, and when that season finale hits and the first part is over, halfway into the story you know, you’re left craving more. It’s brilliant.

Season 2

Picking up soon after the events of the first season, this second half finds Louis and Claudia out in Europe, searching for more vampires so they can truly learn about themselves and this dark gift they’ve been given. This eventually leads them to the Théâtre des Vampires in Paris, France, where they meet up with the coven run by Armand (Assad Zaman). Louis and Armand hit it off, while the coven comes to embrace Claudia as one of their own… but there is a power struggle running in the background, and things could once again turn violent before the story is all said and done.

While the basic plot points of this season stick to Rice’s book, the series makes many more changes and deviations to fit its story and setting. This all revolves around the events at the theater that lead to a very violent conclusion for all involved. Fans of the story will know that something tragic is brewing, and the series works with that, letting the sense of dread linger. It’s rough, and cruel, and the conclusion of the event is awful. But the glorious revenge that comes after feels earned and right.

Still, I do think this season is, in some ways, a tad more uneven. The changes, while justified, take the story further away from the novel and this doesn’t always work to the show’s benefit. The actors are able to sell it, though, smoothing the changes and letting us enjoy our time with the characters. It’s not bad by any sense of the term, just maybe not what I was expecting at every twist, and it felt off to me. Plus, honestly, the conclusion of the season feels just a little rushed, like there’s far more story to tell but the episode count didn’t justify it.

Of course, more seasons are coming, adapting later books in the series, so maybe this will all get ironed out when more episodes are available.