Renfield: Adrian Martinez, Awkwafina are traffic cops in Dracula comedy

A month ago, we heard that Awkwafina was joining the cast of Universal Pictures’ “modern day adventure story” take on Dracula’s henchman Renfield, but at the time no information on her character had been revealed. Now Deadline has broken the news that character actor Adrian Martinez has also landed a role in Renfield – and his casting announcement includes information on both his character and Awkwafina’s! They’re both playing traffic cops in the movie.

Deadline also got their hands on a synopsis that reveals that, while the movie is set in modern day, it won’t be telling us that Renfield just started working for Dracula in 2022. He has been serving the bloodsucker for centuries, and this film will find that he

has grown sick and tired of his centuries as Dracula’s lackey. The henchman finds a new lease on life life and maybe even redemption when he falls for feisty, perennially angry traffic cop Rebecca Quincy.

Awkwafina is playing Rebecca Quincy, and Martinez is taking on the role of her traffic cop partner Chris. The title character Renfield is being played by Nicholas Hoult, with Nicolas Cage as Dracula. Ben Schwartz is also in the cast.

Based on a treatment written by The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman, Renfield will be directed by Chris McKay (The Tomorrow War) from a screenplay by Ryan Ridley (Rick and Morty). In Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula, 

R.M. Renfield was an inmate at a lunatic asylum who was thought to be suffering from delusions but actually is a servant of Dracula. Plot details of the movie weren’t announced, but it’s believed to take place during the present day and is not a period piece.

Kirkman has said Renfield is “a story about him being Dracula’s henchman and how shitty a job that is.” While Universal is developing several monster projects, Deadline previously reported that they’re excited about Renfield because the story’s “mix of humor and action was something the studio was looking for because so many of the other properties have more of a horror element to them.” 

Kirkman, who has described the film as “a violent comedy”, is producing Renfield with David Alpert, Bryan Furst, and Sean Furst of Skybound Entertainment, alongside McKay’s producing partner Samantha Nisenboim.

Adrian Martinez’s credits include Stumptown, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, Focus, The Blacklist: Redemption, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, It’s Kind of a Funny Story, Cop Out, Kick-Ass, Piranha 3DD, and The Guilty.