NBC Moves Forward With Dracula Series

[Wee67]

The story of Count Dracula is coming to the small screen. NBC has given a 10-episode straight-to-series order to Dracula, with The Tudors‘ Jonathan Rhys Meyers set to play the iconic vampire. The series, from producers Tony Krantz and Colin Callender and writer Cole Haddon, is being produced for both NBC and U.K.’s Sky Living. It was originally bought by NBC in January with a “script-to-series” commitment, meaning that it wouldn’t go through a pilot stage but straight to series if NBC brass liked the script.

Dracula is produced by Krantz’s Flame Ventures, Callender’s Playground Entertainment, Universal TV and NBCU International Prods.’ Carnival Films & Television, the company behind phenom Downton Abbey. Based on an idea by Krantz, it is set in the 1890s and has been described as “Dangerous Liaisons meets The Tudors”, which is fitting given that Tudors star Meyers has been tapped to play the title role. The new series reunites Meyers with NBC topped Bob Greenblatt who cast the Irish actor in The Tudors while running Showtime. As a producer, Greenblatt gave Meyers his first starring role in the CBS telefilm Elvis, which was overseen by Universal TV EVP Bela Bajaria, then head of CBS’ movies and miniseries division.
In the NBC/Sky Living series, Dracula (Meyers) arrives in London, posing as an American entrepreneur who maintains that he wants to bring modern science to Victorian society. In reality, he hopes to wreak revenge on the people who ruined his life centuries earlier but falls hopelessly in love with a woman who seems to be a reincarnation of his dead wife. “It is a timeless tale with relevant, surprising twists and turns with the exquisite Jonathan Rhys Meyers in the marquee role,” Bajaria said.

Krantz and Callender are executive producing the series with Gareth Neame and Anne Mensah. Haddon and Flame’s Reece Pearson co-executive produce. Dracula employed the same deal model NBC used for another drama project about an iconic villain, Hannibal, which also had a commitment for a script against a series order and went to series. Dracula is the third straight-to-series drama order by NBC in the past few months following the pickups of Hannibal and Neil Cross’ Crossbones.

Vampires have been hot on the big and the small screen lately with the blockbuster Twilight movie franchise and hit series True Blood and The Vampire Diaries. Meyers is with CAA and Brillstein, Haddon is with ICM Partners and Anonymous.

http://www.deadline.com/2012/07/nbc-...n-rhys-meyers/

[Figuremod73]

So this will be set in victorian times? Sounds pretty ambitious. We'll see, they rarely try hard on the networks anymore. This would be much better than the swarms of reality show.

[Earth 2 Chris]

Hmm...sounds like it COULD be interesting, although I'd rather have seen them just flesh out the novel as a starting point.

Chris

[MIB41]

From the looks of the actor playing the lead role I smell a twinge of Twilight in the casting...Not getting my hopes here.

[Figuremod73]

I always think of Gary Oldman in the role. I guess they want the young crowd.

[ctc]

>it is set in the 1890s and has been described as “Dangerous Liaisons meets The Tudors”

So.... it'll be a stretched out version of the Coppola film?

Don C.

[PNGwynne]

Meyers as actually not that young, and a good actor IMO.

But I have little hope that a network show can have decent "Victorian" production values--even recent PBS/BBC productions have been trimmed.

And the series premise sounds strained.

[thunderbolt]

Can't they just rerun Dark Shadows? Almost sounds like the same plot.

[Earth 2 Chris]

Just noticed, they used a non-Dracula pic of Lugosi. That's from "Mark of the Vampire", the remake of "London After Midnight". Common mistake it seems, though.

Chris