Now, for those that do not have AMC+, there will be SPOILERS ahead for the first season of the televised adaptation of Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire.
There, now that you’ve been sufficiently warned, let’s get into it. Of course, I will be making comparisons to the 1994 film of the same name I only recently watched, but you’ll have to wait for me to actually read the book before I can compare the show to its source material. Regardless, it does seem that both critics and fans of the novels were also big fans of this series. I, myself, was also quite intrigued with this series and frankly I’m bummed that I now have to wait god knows how long for the second season (already renewed, by the way). Oh well, let’s talk about what went down.
First, the major differences. This series was held exclusively in New Orleans, but much further into the future than in the film and the novel. We meet black, Creole man, Louis de Pointe du Lac in 1910 where he’s taken his ancestral plantation money to open up several brothels in the quarter. It’s there that he meets Lestat de Lioncourt, and basically by the end of the first episode Louis is so distraught with the turn his life has taken (the suicide of his brother), that it doesn’t take much convincing on Lestat’s part to change him into a lifelong vampiric companion. It probably doesn’t hurt that Lestat ignited Louis’ sexual awakening as a gay man, but still. Lestat intelligently coerced Louis into this never-ending life at his lowest point. Too bad Louis couldn’t see past the immediate dispair.
The two get along for a while, but then Louis starts to resent Lestat for banishing him to this life. Louis makes it a point to only kill animals, but he needs more. That’s where orphaned, and significantly older, Claudia comes into play. She was half dead when Louis found her, but in order to regain some of his love back, Lestat agreed to change her. They made the most odd little family, but at first Claudia had more in common with Lestat in that they both preferred human blood to that of animals like Louis. This caused a slight rift, but Claudia’s allegiance changed forever to Louis as time went on and Lestat became more unbearable. He was truly the definition of abusive, and poor Louis was the eternal victim. Even in the end when the pair had the chance to kill Lestat for good, Louis made it a point not to burn his body.
All of that storytelling lies pretty close with the film, whose screenplay was written by Rice herself. Of course small details were changed, but I thought that added a lot more intrigue to the story. Clearly, not the whole story was told in this first, seven-episode season, as we only just discover Armand’s existence at the very end. Another thing that’s changed in this series is that Michael is interviewing Louis for a second time in present-day (2022). There was a lot that Louis glossed over or just blatantly left out in their first encounter, but now Louis is promising full transparency. I’m sure he’s sharing more details, but I’m not sure that he’s being 100 percent truthful. It’s also only Louis’ side of the story. I do wonder if at some point Lestat will return with his.
Overall though, this was a really fun, violent, and extravagant series. I thought all the set pieces were incredible, along with the chemistry of all the main cast. I have my hesitations about Armand, but I think I just need to read the novels to get more onboard. With that being said, I might actually follow my own rules this time and not read ahead in the series. Although with the creative liberties taken with the timeline, I might be okay to venture forward. I guess you’ll just have to wait and see! In the meantime, the series finale airs on AMC this coming Sunday and you should definitely do yourselves a favor and watch this show!