The Vampire Chronicles
The Vampire Chronicles is a series of novels and a media franchise created by American writer Anne Rice that revolves around the fictional character Lestat de Lioncourt, a French nobleman turned into a vampire in the 18th century.
Interview with the Vampire (1976) was made into a 1994 film starring Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Antonio Banderas, Christian Slater and Kirsten Dunst. 1988’s The Queen of the Damned was adapted into a 2002 film of the same name, starring Stuart Townsend and Aaliyah and using some material from 1985’s The Vampire Lestat. In August 2014, Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment acquired the motion picture rights to the entire series, but Rice announced that she had regained them in November 2016. A television series adaptation of the novels for streaming service Hulu was announced in July 2018, but these rights expired in December 2019. In May 2020, it was announced that AMC had acquired the rights to both The Vampire Chronicles and Lives of the Mayfair Witches for developing film and television projects.
Rice said in a 2008 interview that her vampires were a “metaphor for lost souls”. The homoerotic overtones of The Vampire Chronicles are also well-documented. As of November 2008, The Vampire Chronicles had sold 80 million copies worldwide.
