Just a few days ago, we told you that Brad Pitt’s production company and Summit Entertainment are teaming to bring us the story of Vlad The Impaler, whom is widely regarded as the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s Dracula (for a history lesson, Wikipedia style, click it HERE). Actor Charlie Hunnam (T.V.’s “Sons of Anarchy) wrote the screenplay, and may even be angling to play the title role; Entertainment Weekly caught up with Hunnam and talked about the obvious: there will be no vampirism in the flick.
“As the script stands now, we don’t touch on vampirism.” Hunnam said. “That was my one non-negotiable area when we were developing it, and thankfully, nobody suggested that we should delve into it at the end.”
Talking about Vlad, however, Hunnam reveals that the character’s nocturnal habits are essential to his tale (and to the vampire myth that has followed him): “He had the advantage of fighting on home ground and he knew the terrain better, which gave him the ability to fight at night. Because he would fight at night, he would try to get his men on a night schedule, so they hadn’t already been up for 12 hours through the day. There are a million ways to show that this guy is the origin of vampirism without actually having him drinking blood.”
Hunnam says the flick will be an epic along the lines of BRAVEHEART and 300. (Personally I’d like more of the former and less of the latter.) So while it doesn’t look like this will be falling into the horror genre, it’s still a project we’ll be keeping our eye on…
Check out the entire Entertainment Weekly interview HERE.