Dracula
Dracula (1897) is a novel by
Irish author
Bram Stoker, and the name of the world's most famous
vampire character.
Dracula has been attributed to many
literary genres including
horror fiction, the
gothic novel and
invasion literature. Structurally it is an
epistolary novel, that is, told as a series of
diary entries and letters.
Literary critics have examined many themes in the novel, such as the role of women in
Victorian culture, sexuality, immigration and folklore. Although Stoker did not invent the vampire, the novel's influence on the popularity of vampires has been singularly responsible for scores of theatrical and movie interpretations throughout the 20th century.
Between 1878 and 1898 Stoker managed the world-famous London
Lyceum Theatre, where he supplemented his income by writing a large number of sensational novels, his most famous being the vampire tale
Dracula published on
May 18,
1897. Parts of it are set around the town of
Whitby, where he was living at the time. While
Dracula is famous today (due in large part to its 20th century life on film), it was not an important or famous work for Victorian readers, being just another pot-boiler adventure among many. Throughout the 1880s and 1890s authors such as
H. Rider Haggard,
Rudyard Kipling,
Robert Louis Stevenson,
Arthur Conan Doyle, and
H.G. Wells wrote many tales in which fantastic creatures threatened the British Empire.
Invasion literature was at a peak, and Stoker's formula of an invasion of England by continental European influences was by 1897 very familiar to readers of fantastic adventure stories.
|
Shakespearian actor and friend of Stoker's, Sir Henry Irving was a real-life inspiration for the character of Dracula, tailor-made to his dramatic presence, gentlemanly mannerisms and speciality playing villain roles. Irving however never agreed to play the part on stage. |
Before writing
Dracula, Stoker spent seven years researching European folklore and stories of vampires, being most influenced by
Emily Gerard's 1885 essay "Transylvania Superstitions". Though it is the most famous vampire novel ever,
Dracula was not the first. It was preceded and partially inspired by
Sheridan Le Fanu's 1871
Carmilla, about a
lesbian vampire who preys upon a lonely young woman. The image of a vampire portrayed as an aristocratic man, like the character of Dracula, was created by
John Polidori in
The Vampyre (1819), during the summer spent with
Frankenstein creator
Mary Shelley and other friends in
1816. Polidori is many times credited as the creator of the vampire genre in fiction, but his vampire story was inspired by elements of
Lord Byron's vampire poem,
The Giaour (1813).
The Lyceum Theatre where Stoker worked between 1878 and 1898 was headed by the tyrannical actor-manager
Henry Irving, who was Stoker's real-life inspiration for the mannerisms of Dracula, and who Stoker hoped would play Dracula in a stage version. Although Irving never did agree to do a stage version, Dracula's dramatic sweeping gestures and gentlemanly mannerisms drew their living embodiment from Irving.
The Dead Un-Dead was one of Stoker's original titles for
Dracula, and up until a few weeks before publication, the manuscript was titled simply
The Un-Dead. The name of Stoker's count was originally going to be Count Vampyre, but while doing research Stoker ran across an intriguing word in the Romanian language: "Dracul", meaning "the Devil". There was also a historic figure known as
Vlad the Impaler, but whether or not Stoker based his character on him remains debated (see "Historical connections" below).
Dracula is an
epistolary novel, written as collection of diary entries, telegrams, and letters from the characters, as well as fictional clippings from the Whitby and London newspapers, and dictation discs. This literary style, made most famous by one of the most popular novels of the 19th century,
The Woman in White (1860), was considered rather old-fashioned by the time of the publication of
Dracula, but it adds a sense of realism and provides the reader with the perspective of most of the major characters.
Dracula has been the basis for countless
films and plays. Three of the most famous are
Nosferatu (1922),
Dracula (1931), and
Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992).
Nosferatu was produced while Stoker's widow was still alive, and the filmmakers were forced to change the setting and the names of the characters for copyright reasons. The vampire in
Nosferatu is called Count Orlok rather than Count Dracula.
Bram Stoker's Dracula, while closer to the novel's plot than most movies produced earlier (or since), reimagines the Count as a tragic figure instead of a monster. It adds an opening sequence that focuses on the Count's Romanian background, and inserts a new romantic subplot into the story.
Stoker wrote several other novels dealing with horror and supernatural themes, but none achieved the lasting fame or success of
Dracula. His other novels include
The Snake's Pass (
1890),
The Jewel of Seven Stars (
1903), and
The Lair of the White Worm (1911).
The story begins with Jonathan Harker, a newly-qualified English
solicitor, being invited to the
Count's crumbling, remote
castle (situated in the
Carpathian Mountains, on the border of
Transylvania and
Moldavia), to provide legal support for a
real estate transaction on behalf of Harker's employer in London. At first seduced by the Count's gracious manner, he soon discovers he has become a prisoner and begins to see disquieting facets of the Count's daily life. Searching for a way out of the castle one night, he falls under the spell of three wanton female vampires, the
Brides of Dracula, but is saved at the last minute by the Count who wants to retain Harker as a friend to teach him about London, where the Count plans to travel among the "teeming millions". Harker barely escapes from the castle with his life.
Not long afterward, a
Russian ship runs aground during a fierce
tempest, on the shores of
Whitby, a coastal town in
England. All passengers and crew are dead. A huge
dog or
wolf is seen running from the ship, which contains nothing but boxes of dirt from Transylvania: Count Dracula, in his animal form, has arrived in England.
Soon the Count is menacing Harker's devoted fiancée,
Wilhemina "Mina" Murray, and her vivacious friend,
Lucy Westenra. Lucy receives three
marriage proposals in one day, from Arthur Holmwood (Lord Godalming); an
American cowboy,
Quincey Morris; and an
asylum psychiatrist, Dr. John Seward. There is a notable encounter between Dracula and Seward's patient
Renfield, an insane man who means to consume
insects,
spiders, and
birds, and other creatures — in ascending order of size — in order to absorb their "life force". Renfield acts as a kind of motion sensor, detecting the proximity of Dracula and releasing clues accordingly.
Lucy begins to waste away suspiciously. All of her suitors fret and Seward calls in his old teacher, Professor
Abraham Van Helsing from
Amsterdam. Van Helsing immediately determines the cause of Lucy's condition, but refuses to disclose it, knowing that Seward's faith in him will be shaken if he starts spouting off about vampires. Van Helsing tries multiple
blood transfusions, but they are clearly losing ground. On a night when Van Helsing must return to Amsterdam (and his message to Seward asking him to watch the Westenra household is accidentally sent to the wrong address), Lucy and her mother are attacked in the night by a
wolf. Mrs Westenra, who has a heart condition, dies of fright, and Lucy herself apparently dies soon after.
Lucy is buried, but soon afterward the newspapers report a "bloofer lady" (sometimes explained as "beautiful lady") stalking children in the night. Van Helsing, knowing that this means Lucy has become a vampire, confides in Seward, Arthur, and Morris. The suitors and Van Helsing track her down, and after a disturbing confrontation between her vampiric self and Arthur, they stake her heart and
behead her.
Around the same time, Jonathan Harker arrives home from Transylvania (where Mina joined and married him after his escape from the castle); he and Mina also join the coalition, who now turn their attentions to dealing with Dracula himself.
After Dracula learns of Van Helsing and the others' plot against him, he takes revenge by visiting Mina at least three times. Dracula also feeds Mina his blood, creating a mind bond between them, aiming to control her. The only way to forestall this is to kill Dracula first. Mina slowly succumbs to the blood of the vampire that flows through her veins, switching back and forth from a state of consciousness to a state of semi-trance during which she is telepathically connected with Dracula. It is this connection which they start to use to track Dracula's movements.
Dracula flees back to his castle in Transylvania, followed by Van Helsing's gang, who manage to track him down just before sundown and kill him by "shearing through the kneck" and stabbing him in the heart with a
bowie knife. Dracula crumbles to dust, his spell is lifted and Mina freed from the marks. Quincey Morris is killed in the final battle, stabbed by gypsies; the survivors return to England.
Whether or not Dracula was actually slain is never addressed, as he was attacked in a fashion dissimilar to Lucy and his reaction is distinctly different. However, Stoker's original manuscript contains a passage removed from the published novel in which Castle Dracula literally explodes at the instant of the Count's death, providing a note of finality to his demise.
The book closes with a note about Mina's and Jonathan's married life and the birth of their first-born son, whom they name Quincey in remembrance of their American friend.
Dracula's Guest
In
1914, two years after Stoker's death,
Dracula's Guest was published. This was in fact the deleted first chapter from the original manuscript, which the publishers deemed unnecessary to the overall story. It sees
Jonathan Harker encounter the ghost of a female vampire called
Countess Dolingen in a snow-covered graveyard during
Walpurgis Night.
Although
Dracula is a work of fiction, it does contain some historical references. The historical connections with the novel and how much Stoker really knew about the history is a matter of conjecture and debate.
Following the publication of
In Search of Dracula by
Radu Florescu and
Raymond McNally in
1972, the supposed connections between the historical
Vlad III Dracula of
Wallachia and Bram Stoker's fictional Dracula attracted popular attention. During the six-year reign of Vlad III (
1456–
1462), "Vlad the Impaler" is said to have killed from 20,000 to 40,000 European civilians (political rivals, criminals, and anyone else he considered "useless to humanity"), mainly by using his favourite method of impaling them on a sharp pole. (It should be noted, however, that the main source of Romanian history from this time is records by
German settlers in neighboring
Transylvania, who had frequent clashes with Vlad for political and economic reasons, and may be somewhat biased.) Vlad is revered as a folk hero by
Romanians for driving off invading Turks with his brutal tactics; his impaled victims are said to have included as many as 100,000
Turkish Muslims.
Historically, the name "Dracula" is derived from a secret fraternal order of knights called the
Order of the Dragon, founded by
King Sigismund of Hungary (who became the
Holy Roman Emperor in
1410) to uphold
Christianity and defend the Empire against the
Ottoman Turks.
Vlad II Dracul, father of Vlad III, was admitted to the Order around
1431 because of his bravery in fighting the Turks. From 1431 onward Vlad II wore the emblem of the order and later, as ruler of Wallachia, his
coinage bore the dragon symbol. People believed the dragon to be a devil, thus they called his
Vlad Dracul(Vlad the Devil). In archaic Romanian the ending
-ulea meant "the son of". Vlad III thus became Vlad
Draculea, "The Son of the Devil".
Certainly Stoker did find the name Dracula in his reading on
Romanian history. This became a replacement for the name
Count Wampyr, which he had intended to use for his villain. Recently, however, many Dracula scholars led by Elizabeth Miller have questioned the connection's depth. It now seems likely that Stoker knew little of Vlad himself, other than the name Dracula which was attributed to him. Certainly the sections of the novel in which Dracula recounts his history are garbled rephrasings of the one work Stoker's notes show he did consult on Romanian history (which gives few details on Vlad's reign, and does not mention his use of impalement). Most importantly, given Stoker's meticulous use of historical background to make it more horrific, it seems unlikely he would have failed to mention that his villain Dracula had impaled thousands of people if he had actually known much of Vlad's background. Nor is Dracula ever called "Vlad" in the novel. Furthermore in the novel Dracula claims to be a
Szekler (
Székely in Hungarian) - "We Szekelys have a right to be proud..." - whereas Vlad is clearly an ethnic
Vlach. Finally, no one compared Vlad to a vampire in his lifetime (Being a descendant of the
Dacian "Wolf People" who was sometimes called a "Great
Berserker" by the Germans, it is possible that some associated him with
lycanthropy).
In writing
Dracula, Stoker may also have drawn upon stories about the
sídhe — some of which feature blood-drinking women — and the Dracula legend as he created it and as it has been portrayed in films and television shows ever since may be a compound of various influences; many of Stoker's biographers and literary critics have found strong similarities to an earlier Irish writer,
Sheridan le Fanu's, classic of the vampire genre,
Carmilla.
It has been suggested Stoker was influenced by the history of Countess
Elizabeth Bathory, who was born, like Dracula, in Hungary. It is believed that Bathory tortured and killed up to 700 servant girls in order to bathe in or drink their blood. She believed that the blood of the girls preserved her youth, which may explain why Dracula appeared younger after feeding.[
1]
Some have claimed the castle of Count Dracula was inspired by
Slains Castle, at which Bram Stoker was a guest of the 19th
Earl of Erroll. However, as Stoker visited the castle in
1895, five years after work on Dracula had started there is unlikely to be much connection. Many of the scenes in
Whitby and
London are based on real places which Stoker frequently visited himself, although in some cases he misrepresents the geography for the sake of the plot.
It has been suggested that Stoker received much historical information from
Arminius Vámbéry, a
Hungarian professor he met at least twice. Miller argues that "there is nothing to indicate that the conversation included Vlad,
vampires, or even
Transylvania" and that "Furthermore, there is no record of any other correspondence between Stoker and Vambery, nor is Vambery mentioned in Stoker's notes for Dracula." [
2]
The novel is narrated by multiple voices — Jonathan's journal of his trip to Transylvania, Mina's diary, and Seward's recorded journal, as well as letters and newspaper items.
Although somewhat crude and certainly sensational, the novel does have psychological power, and the sexual longings underlying the vampire attacks are manifest. As one critic wrote:
What has become clearer and clearer, particularly in the fin de siècle
years of the twentieth century, is that the novel's power has its source in the sexual implications of the blood exchange between the vampire and his victims...Dracula
has embedded in it a very disturbing psychosexual allegory whose meaning I am not sure Stoker entirely understood: that there is a demonic force at work in the world whose intent is to eroticize women. In Dracula
we see how that force transforms Lucy Westenra, a beautiful nineteen-year-old virgin, into a shameless slut. (
Leonard Wolf, "Introduction" to the Signet Classic Edition, 1992).
Dracula may be viewed as a novel about the struggle between tradition and modernity at the
fin de siècle. Throughout, there are various references to changing
gender roles; Mina Harker is a thoroughly modern woman, as she uses (then) modern technologies such as the
typewriter, but she still embodies a traditional gender role as an assistant school mistress.
Stoker's novel deals in general with the conflict between the world of the past — full of folklore, myth, legend, and religious piety — and the emerging modern world of technology, logical positivism, and secularism.
Van Helsing epitomizes this struggle because he uses, at the time, extremely modern technologies like blood transfusions; but he is not so modern as to eschew the idea that a demonic being could be causing Lucy's illness, thus he spreads garlic around the sashes and doors of her room and makes her wear a garlic necklace. After Lucy's death, he receives an indulgence from a
Catholic cleric to use the
Eucharist (held by the Church to be transubstantiated into the body and blood of
Jesus) in his fight against Dracula. In trying to bridge the rational/superstitious conflict within the story, he cites then-new sciences, such as
hypnotism, that were only recently considered magical. He also quotes (without attribution) the
American psychologist William James, whose writings on the power of belief become the only way to deal with this conflict.
Jonathan Harker's character displays the problems of dwelling in a strictly rational modern world. Visiting Count Dracula in Eastern Europe, Jonathan scoffs at the peasants who tell him to delay his visit until after
Saint George's feast day. As a solicitor, Jonathan is concerned "with facts — bare meagre facts, verified by books and figures, and of which there can be no doubt" (
Dracula). All of Jonathan's rationality weakens him to what he witnesses at Castle Dracula. For example, the first time Jonathan witnesses the Count crawling down the castle face down, he is in complete disbelief. Not believing what he sees, he attempts to explain what he saw as a trick of the moon light.
The characters of
Dracula use (then) modern
technology and rationalism to defeat the count. For example, during their pursuit of the vampire, they use
railroads and
steamships, not to mention the
telegraph, to keep a step ahead of him (in contrast, the count escapes in a sailboat). Van Helsing uses the aforementioned method of hypnotism to pinpoint Dracula's location. Mina even employs the then-primitive field of
criminology to anticipate the count's actions, and cites both
Cesare Lombroso and
Max Nordau, who at the time of the novel were considered experts in this field.
After the death of
Nicolae Ceauşescu, a tourist industry sprang up in
Transylvania (and, to a lesser extent, in
Wallachia). However, Romanians have mixed feelings about linking one of their national heroes and the vampire monster.
Historical places connected to Vlad Ţepeş are publicised under a Dracula theme catering largely, but not entirely, to foreign markets.
Bran Castle, which has only a very tangential connection with the historical Vlad Ţepeş, now exaggerates that connection and promotes itself as "Dracula's Castle". [
3] A dungeon-themed disco, catering to a mostly Romanian crowd and located in the basement of a former inn immediately adjacent to the
Curtea Veche ("Old Court") calls itself by the English-language name "Impaler". The well-preserved medieval town of
Sighişoara, Vlad Ţepeş's birthplace, seriously considered building a Dracula
theme park on the edge of town, but in the end it was decided that such a site would cheapen the beauty and history of the medieval city and the plan was blocked. The park was then to have been built close to Bucharest (the capital, which is nowhere near Transylvania) but plans have subsequently been scrapped.
See also: Vampire fictionDespite its important contributions to vampire fiction, several popular traits of fictional vampires are absent. Count Dracula is killed by a bowie knife, not a wooden stake. The destruction of the vampire Lucy is a three-part process (staking,
decapitation, and
garlic in the mouth), not the simple stake-only procedure often found in later vampire stories. Dracula has the ability to travel as a mist and to scale the external walls of his castle. One very famous trait Stoker added is the inability to be seen in mirrors, which is not something found in traditional Eastern European
folklore.
It is also notable in the novel that Dracula can walk about in the daylight, in bright sunshine, though apparently without the ability to use most of his powers, like turning into mist or a bat. He is still strong and fast enough to struggle with and escape from most of his male pursuers, in a scene in the book. Traditional vampire folklore does not usually hold that sunlight is fatal to vampires though they are
nocturnal. It is only with the film
Nosferatu that the daylight is first depicted as deadly to vampires.
The character of Count Dracula has remained popular over the years, and many
films have used the character as a villain, while others have referenced him in movie titles such as
Daughter of Dracula, Lady Dracula, and
Zoltan, Hound of Dracula. An estimated 160 films (
as of 2004) feature Dracula in a major role, a number second only to
Sherlock Holmes. The total number of films that include a reference to Dracula may reach as high as 649 movies, according to the
Internet Movie Database.
Most tellings of the Dracula story include not only the Count, but the rest of the "cast": Jonathan and Mina Harker, Van Helsing, and Renfield. (Notably, the novel roles of characters Jonathan Harker and Renfield are more than occasionally reversed or combined, as are the roles of Mina and Lucy. Quincey Morris is usually omitted entirely.)
One of the first film adaptations of Stoker's story actually caused Stoker's estate to sue for
copyright infringement. In
1922,
silent film director
F. W. Murnau made a
horror film called
Nosferatu: eine Symphonie des Grauens ('Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror'), which took the story of Dracula and set it in
Transylvania and
Germany. In the story, Dracula's role was changed to that of
Count Orlok, one of the most hideous versions of the vampire ever to be created for a movie, played by
Max Schreck (whose name literally means 'fright').
The Stoker estate won its lawsuit and all existing prints of
Nosferatu were ordered to be destroyed. However, a number of
pirated copies of the movie survived to the present era, where they entered the public domain.
Nosferatu was also remade
in 1979 by
Werner Herzog.
In
1927 the story was adapted for the Broadway stage by
Hamilton Deane and
John L. Balderston and starred
Bela Lugosi (Hungarian-born actor) and
Edward Van Sloan as the Count and Van Helsing respectively.
The
1931 film version of
Dracula starred
Bela Lugosi and was directed by
Tod Browning. It is one of the most famous versions of the story and is commonly considered a horror classic. In
2000 the United States
Library of Congress deemed the film "culturally significant" and selected it for preservation in the
National Film Registry. It is an adaptation of the
1927 play and Van Sloan also transferred his role to the big screen. The films only had music during the opening and closing credits. In
1999 Philip Glass was commissioned to compose a musical score to accompany the film. The current DVD release allows access to this music.
At the same time as the 1931 Lugosi film a
Spanish language version was filmed for release in Mexico. It was filmed at night using the same sets as the Tod Browning production with a different cast and crew (a common practice in the early days of sound films).
George Melford's was the director and it starred
Carlos Villarías as the Count,
Eduardo Arozamena as Van Helsing and
Lupita Tovar as Eva.
Due to America's censorship laws, Melford's
Dracula contains scenes that could not be put in the final cut of the more familiar English version. There is considerable debate among fans over which film is better. Fans of Melford's version say the acting of the Spanish version is crisper and the pace is much quicker -- and there are not any hammy close-ups of Lugosi. It is also included on the available DVD.
During the era of the
1930s and
1940s, the
Universal Studios horror films made Dracula a household name by starring him as a villain in a number of movies, including several where he met other monsters (the most famous of which is the comedy
Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein in which Lugosi played Dracula on film for only the second and final time.)
Universal Studios productions of Dracula
The Universal Studios films in which Dracula (or a relative) appeared (and the actor portraying the character) were:
#
Dracula (
1931 -
Bela Lugosi. A second version was filmed simultaneously in Spanish, with
Carlos Villar as Dracula)#
Dracula's Daughter (
1936 -
Gloria Holden)#
Son of Dracula (
1943 -
Lon Chaney, Jr.)#
House of Frankenstein (
1944 -
John Carradine)#
House of Dracula (
1945 - Carradine)#
Bud Abbott Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein (
1948 - Lugosi. This film is usually known as
Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, however the title given here is the official on-screen title according to the Internet Movie Database.)#
Dracula (
1979 -
Frank Langella)#
Van Helsing (
2004 - Richard Roxburgh)
In
1938,
Orson Welles and
John Houseman chose
Dracula to be the inaugural episode of the new radio show featuring their Broadway production company,
The Mercury Theatre on the Air. The adaptation was faithful to the book, although condensed to fit in the show's hour-long format. Welles was the voice of Dracula.
Hammer Films productions of Dracula
In 1958,
Hammer Films produced
Dracula (1958), a newer, more Gothic version of the story, starring
Christopher Lee as Dracula and
Peter Cushing as Van Helsing. It is widely considered to be one of the best versions of the story to be adapted to film, and in
2004 was named by the
magazine Total Film as the 30th greatest British film of all time. Although it takes many liberties with the novel's plot, the creepy atmosphere and charismatic performance of Lee make it memorable and favored. It was released in the United States as
Horror of Dracula to avoid confusion with the earlier Lugosi version. This was followed by a long series of Dracula films, usually featuring Lee as Dracula.
The Hammer films in which Dracula (or a relative) appeared (and the actor portraying the character) were:
#
Dracula (
1958) -
Christopher Lee. Released in the US as
Horror of Dracula#
The Brides of Dracula (
1960 -
David Peel as Dracula disciple Baron Meinster)#
Dracula: Prince of Darkness (
1966 - Lee)#
Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (
1968 - Lee)#
Taste the Blood of Dracula (
1969 - Lee)#
Scars of Dracula (
1970 - Lee)#
Dracula A.D. 1972 (
1972 - Lee)#
The Satanic Rites of Dracula (
1973 - Lee). Released in the US as
Count Dracula and His Vampire Bride#
The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires (
1974 -
John Forbes-Robertson). Variously released as
The Seven Brothers Meet Dracula and
Dracula and the Seven Golden VampiresChristopher Lee, the British actor who played in the Hammer Dracula films, reminisced in a 1999 inteview for NPR: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1065958
Other productions 1967 - 1979
The Fearless Vampire Killers (1967) was directed by
Roman Polanski and introduced him to
Sharon Tate.
Count Dracula, directed by
Jesus Franco starring Christopher Lee as Dracula. While not a part of the Hammer series some fans feel that it is close to the spirit of the book.
In 1970,
Al Adamson created
Dracula Vs. Frankenstein.
In 1972,
Paul Naschy starred in
Dracula's Great Love, directed by
Javier Aguirre for the Spanish production company Janus Films. This movie predated the vision of Dracula as a romantic character to
Francis Ford Coppola's by 20 years.
In 1973, a major television movie version starring
Jack Palance was produced by
Dan Curtis, best known for producing the gothic
soap opera Dark Shadows. Filmed in
Yugoslavia and England, it was a fairly faithful and moody piece.
In 1974,
Andy Warhol presented an outrageously campy Dracula (also known as
Blood for Dracula), directed by
Paul Morrissey and starring cult icon
Udo Kier.
Dracula Père et Fils 1976, a French movie again starring Christopher Lee as Dracula.
1977 saw a BBC version made for television starring
Louis Jourdan and directed by
Philip Saville. This version is one of the more faithful adaptations of the book. It includes all of the main characters from the book (only blending together Arthur and Quincey) and has scenes of Jonathon recording events in his diary and Dr. Seward speaking into his dictaphone.
1977 also saw a revival of the 1927 broadway version produced by
Nelle Nugent. The atmospheric sets and costumes were designed by
Edward Gorey. The Count was portrayed by
Frank Langella and, like Lugosi before him, he would go on to perform the role on the big screen. The same Gorey sets and costumes were used for a U.S. touring version of the play starring
Jeremy Brett. The Deane-Balderston lines were altered somewhat and played for a more comedic effect.
In
1978, an independent film company produced the horror thriller
Zoltan, Hound of Dracula starring
Michael Pataki as the mild-mannered family psychiatrist destined to encounter the resurrected hound of Dracula.
1979 saw three film versions released.In the first
Frank Langella starred opposite
Laurence Olivier as a sexually charged version of the Count in
Dracula. It is considered of uneven quality, though the
John Williams score is superb. That year also saw the release of
Love at First Bite, a
romantic comedy spoof set in contemporary
New York City starring
George Hamilton as the count.The third film is the previously mentioned
Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht starring
Klaus Kinski and directed by Werner Herzog.
Dracula movies 1980 - 1999
In
1992,
Francis Ford Coppola produced and directed a new version of the film, called
Bram Stoker's Dracula starring
Gary Oldman,
Winona Ryder,
Keanu Reeves, and
Anthony Hopkins. Coppola's story includes a backstory telling how Dracula (who is the historical Vlad Tepes in this version) became a vampire, as well as a subplot in which Mina Harker was revealed to be the
reincarnation of Dracula's greatest love. This story is not part of Stoker's original. The soundtrack includes 'Lovesong for a Vampire', sung by
Annie Lennox.
In
1995,
Mel Brooks did a comedic parody,
Dracula: Dead and Loving It, which parodied all of the standard Dracula themes, but especially noteworthy was the scene where Dracula's reflection was noticeably absent in a mirror as he danced at a ball, to the horror of those watching. A scene where Van Helsing has Harker pound a stake into a sleeping Lucy's chest with a seemingly impossible amount of blood spraying back on himself asks the question: just where does all the blood go?
Mel Brooks played Van Helsing as an aged Professor. Dracula was played by
Leslie Nielsen.
Dracula adaptations 2000 to present
Patrick Lussier took a stab at the legend with his modern day
Dracula 2000, promoted as
Wes Craven Presents Dracula 2000.
Wes Craven was an executive producer. It was released in the UK as
Dracula 2001. To discover how to destroy Dracula, Van Helsing (portrayed by
Christopher Plummer) keeps himself alive with injections of Dracula's blood. When thieves steal the vampire and crash near
New Orleans, Van Helsing and his ward must track down the vampire and save Van Helsing's daughter Mary. The film also gives Dracula a new identity as the damned soul of
Judas Iscariot after being cast out of both Heaven and Hell.
In 2002, Canadian cult film director
Guy Maddin released his screen adaptation of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet's version of the count's tale, a
ballet set to the music of
Gustav Mahler and titled
Dracula, Pages From a Virgin's Diary. Mainly greyscale until Dracula is cut and bleeds gold coloured coins.
The character of Mina Harker appeared in the 2003 film adaptation of the
graphic novel The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen as a vampiric heroine played by
Peta Wilson.
Van Helsing is a film based on the vampire-hunter Van Helsing from the book, played in this case by
Hugh Jackman, only reinvented as an immortal action hero assigned by the
Vatican to hunt monsters.
Richard Roxburgh portrays Dracula in this reinvigoration of the 1930s and 1940s Universal Horror monsters which also featured new versions of the
Frankenstein Monster and
The Wolf Man. In this movie, Dracula is somewhat of a super vampire, impervious to the normal methods of killing a vampire.
A character named Drake serves as the primary antagonist in
Blade: Trinity, in which a group of vampires summon him in order to finally defeat Blade. While he is not confirmed directly to be Dracula, Drake is implied to have lived under several different aliases and personalities, one of which may have been the infamous vampire.
Dominic Purcell portrays Drake.
2005 saw the premiere of Dracula's most recent play incarnation, an adaptation by playwright
P. Shane Mitchell. By the end of 2005, the opera Dracula, by the Colombian composer Héctor Fabio Torres Cardona opened in Manizales, Colombia. A French Canadian musical production ("Dracula: Entre l'amour et la mort"[
4]) opened in Montreal in January 2006, starring Bruno Pelletier.
2006* A new musical version of DRACULA is in the works with book and lyrics by Joseph Traynor and music by Eddison baptiste. This is the first part in a Dracula trilogy Mr Traynor is working on. The other shows of the trilogy are DRACULA UNBOUND and DRACULA RESSURECTION
Marc Warren will star as Dracula, with
David Suchet as Van Helsing, in a new television adaptation produced by
ITV Productions for
BBC Wales and due to be screened by
BBC One over the 2006 Christmas season.
Like
Frankenstein,
Dracula has inspired many literary tributes or parodies, including
Stephen King's
Salem's Lot,
Kim Newman's
Anno Dracula,
Anne Rice's
Interview with the Vampire,
Elizabeth Kostova's
The Historian,
Fred Saberhagen's
The Dracula Tape,
Wendy Swanscombe's
erotic parody
Vamp, and
Dan Simmons's
Children of the Night.
Loren D. Estleman's novel
The Case of the Sanguinary Count pits Dracula against that equally venerable Victorian-era character,
Sherlock Holmes, as does
Fred Saberhagen's
The Holmes-Dracula File.
Freda Warrington's
Dracula the Undead is a sequel to
Dracula.
Dracula has been a recurring character in many
comic books, most notably, the
Marvel comic Tomb of Dracula written primarily by
Marv Wolfman (following two issues each by
Gerry Conway,
Archie Goodwin and
Gardner Fox) and drawn by
Gene Colan for
Marvel Comics in the
1970s(Prior to that
Dell Comics had produced a
superhero version of Dracula). Mina Harker is a member of the
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, a
pastiche comic book, and film featuring numerous
Victorian characters.(Her portrayal in the film of the same name is markedly different from the character in the comic. The comic version of Mina seems to be, largely, an ordinary human, while her film counterpart is a vampire herself. How this is meant to be reconciled with Mina being freed from Dracula at the end of Stokers novel is unclear.) One popular
Elseworlds book by
DC Comics is
Batman and Dracula: Red Rain, which features the caped crusader fighting Dracula, who has come to
Gotham City. An animated movie called
The Batman vs. Dracula pitting the two characters against one another aired on Cartoon Network and has been released on DVD.
In
Warhammer Fantasy Battles there is a long dynasty of titled vampires in the
Empire who rose up against the mortal Emperor and started the Undead wars. The von Carstein Trilogy (Inheritance, Dominion and Retribution) as novelised by
Steven Savile fictionalises the lives of the most infamous these Vampires, Vlad Von Carstein and his gets, Konrad and Mannfred. Vlad himself draws on Dracula stereotype.
In most
videogames of the
Castlevania series (known as "Akumajo Dracula" (Demon Castle Dracula) in
Japan),
Count Vlad Tepes Dracula, as he is known in the series, is the ultimate source of evil that the protagonists must confront, after adventuring through Dracula's
castle. The other aspect in relations to the Count is his son, Adrian Farenheights Tepes, commonly known as "
Alucard", who has dedicated his life to insure the survival of the human race and the preventing of his father's tyranny. It is often said by both fans and
Konami that the Castlevania timeline is meant to exist in the same universe as the Bram Stoker novel. This is evidenced in Castlevania:Bloodlines, as one of the protagonists is a relative of Quincy Morris.
Now-defunct software company
CRL produced a series of games in the 1980s featuring classic horror classics including Dracula. These were the first game titles in the UK to receive
BBFC certification (they were rated "15"), normally reserved for films and videos. There were two adventure games, Dracula: Resurrection and The Last Sanctuary. Both took place after the novels end and continued Jon and Mina's fight against the Count.
In the
manga and
anime series
Hellsing, the vampire
Alucard (note: Dracula spelled backwards) is heavily suggested to be Dracula himself, having been magically bound into servitude to the
Hellsing family rather than being destroyed outright. He uses two specially-made pistols that are otherwise unable to be carried by humans.
Dracula has also appeared as a villain in the series
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, in an episode called
Buffy vs. Dracula.
Buffy Summers, having "seen his movies", waits after first killing him, noting that he "always comes back". In the comic (of debatable canonicity),
Spike vs. Dracula , it is revealed that Dracula has connections to the gypsy clan that cursed
Angel with a soul. He is an acquaintance of
Anya Jenkins, and Spike claims he is a sell-out of the vampire world, fond of magic and Hollywood. The vampire mythology popularised by
Bram Stoker in the Dracula novel is also used as a basis for the mythology in the show, primarily the methods in which vampires are killed. Other additions to this base mythology include vampires requiring an invitation to enter someone's home, and the disfigured "vamp face" vampires transform into when attacking a victim. In addition, the mythology featured in the
Buffyverse is somewhat flexible with the process of "turning" someone into a vampire. The basic blood sharing ritual remains the same, but the sequence of events after the victim's death are often changed to suit the storyline of a particular episode. Some instances show a victim turning into a vampire immediately after death, while others show upwards of a couple of days between the time of death and the time the vampire rises.
In the book series
Vampire Hunter D which takes place ten thousand years in the future, D's adversary Count Magnus discovers that D is the son of Dracula, the Ancient Ancestor. D also nearly states this during a psychological attack in the second volume,
Raiser of Gales.
Dracula has even been adapted for children's literature and entertainment, serving as the basis for several vampire cartoon characters over the years. Dracula (or at least his portrayal by Bela Lugosi) is the basis for the
Muppet character named
Count von Count on
Sesame Street. Cartoon vampires based upon Dracula also include
Cosgrove Hall's
Count Duckula,
Filmation's
Quackula, and
Count Chocula, the animated mascot of the
breakfast cereal of the same name. He also made an appearance in some episodes of
The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, as an old monster in a Retirement home for monsters. He also appeared in
Codename: Kids Next Door as the villain, named Count Spankulot. Instead of sucking blood, he spanks naughty children.
In addition, Dracula, The Wolf Man, The Mummy, Frankenstein's Monster, and the Creature from the Black Lagoon all appeared in a 1980s movie called
The Monster Squad in which a magical amulet, and its survival or destruction every hundred years, will turn the tide one way or the other in the neverending struggle between the forces of good and evil. Dracula is at his deadly best in this film, surviving all the way to the end of the film, where he is shown battling Abraham Van Helsing in his final scene in the film.
The association of the book with the
Yorkshire fishing village of
Whitby has led to the staging of the twice-yearly
Whitby Gothic Weekend, an event that sees the town visited by
Goths from all over Britain and occasionally from other parts of the world.
*
Elizabeth Báthory*
Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu*
Vlad III Dracula*
Tsutomu Miyazaki*
Alucard, Dracula spelled backwards
*
Blacula*
Universal Monsters*
Draculin*
Christopher Frayling -
Vampyres: Lord Byron to Count Dracula (1992) ISBN 0571167926
*
Dracula between Hero and Vampire*
The Politics of Count Dracula*
Free ebook of Dracula at
Project Gutenberg*
Dracula -
HTML version of this classic book
*
Elizabeth Miller's Dracula Page - details on her Dracula theories*
Vlad Dracul (1390? - 1447)
