by Jason Adams
It's been a lousy couple of weeks for Vampires and the people who love them -- first there was Morbius, full stop. Then there were those pretty iffy-looking photos from the upcoming AMC series adapting Anne Rice's Interview With the Vampire. And then this week the bloodsuckers we love to watch suck have taken two more great big hits...
Monday night Deadline reported that the great Karyn Kusama's movie Mina Harker -- which was set to drop that Dracula character (played by Blindspotting actress Jasmine Cephas Jones) in a modern day Los Angeles where she would, presumably, encounter a vampire or two -- was canned only three weeks before it was set to start shooting, because primary backer Miramax had pulled out. (Even if Miramax isn't run by the Weinsteins anymore those of us who were familiar with that studio's shitty treatment of yore of horror movies no doubt cringed a little extra at this connection.) No word if the film's primary studio of Blumhouse will try to find another way to finance the movie, but we sure do hope so -- Kusama is a true talent, and we were excited to see her tackle ol' Drac a new way.
And the second big stake driven into Vampire-dom's heart this week came via filmmaker Robert Eggers, who's out fervently promoting his new movie The Northman and along the way making it quite plain that things are not at all looking good for his long-troubled re-do of Nosferatu. On Marc Maron's podcast yesterday he apparently brought the axe down the hardest, saying that they got real close but scheduling conflicts with actors (including his beloved and much-much-in-demand Anya Taylor-Joy) have pretty much slammed the coffin lid shut on this for a long time, if not permanently. And listen, if it was anyone else talking about remaking Nosferatu I'd be fine with showing them the door -- we already have two fantastic Nosferatu movies (three if you count Shadow of the Vampire, which you should) and there's no need to try our luck. But Eggers seems to me entirely the right man for the gig -- I can practically see his version in my head already, and I want it out of there and in front of me real real bad. So let's hope both of these projects in the immediate future find more luck, less garlic!