Anne Rice re-condemns the casting of Tom Cruise as the vampire Lestat, and pretty much lets Hollywood have it in the shorts (though she loves movies, especially if they have Tom Berenger in them).
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To her fans, Anne Rice is more than a writer. She's the creator of a world. With her books Interview With the Vampire, The Vampire Lestat, The Queen of the Damned and The Tale of the Body Thief she has let them in on the timeless lives of some particularly horny and philosophical vampires. To show their support, Rice's readers buy her books by the millions, write her letters and notes, attend readings by the hordes, and show up at her annual New Orleans Halloween party dressed as vampires.
For almost 20 years, college dorms were abuzz with this question: Who will play the vampires Lestat and Louis when Hollywood finally makes the movie of Interview With the Vampire! The list has, at various times, included everyone from Anthony Hopkins and Cher to Christopher Walken and Daniel Day-Lewis. Recently, in a bit of casting that outdoes Tom Hanks's Sherman McCoy in The Bonfire of the Vanities, producer David Geffen and director Neil Jordan announced their choice: Lestat, that dreamy, otherworldly vampire, would be played by Tom Cruise. Suffice it to say, the fans went ballistic. So, in a way, did Anne Rice.
Over a Caesar salad at the St. Regis hotel in New York, Anne Rice talks about the casting of Interview With the Vampire, about what actors turn her on, and about how she thinks up all the stuff that turns her readers on.
MARTHA FRANKEL: So let me quote you: "You can't imagine how much I despise Hollywood producers and the studio system and many of the people there. I think they're awful, I can't warn writers enough to stay away from them. They will kill you."
ANNE RICE: [Laughter]
Q: Don't hold back, Anne. Tell us how you really feel.
A: Well, it's true, I've had a lot of different experiences in Hollywood, some I'm not really at liberty to talk about. I've been through a lot of bullshit and foolishness.
Q: Connected with Interview With the Vampire?
A: I've been involved with Interview With the Vampire for a long time. I've had a good relationship with [producer] David Geffen, although it's kind of iffy right now. When I was working on the script for Interview, I told him I wanted to do exactly what I wanted to do with it. And that's the way I wrote it. [Director] Neil Jordan has rewritten it, and they are putting his name on the credits, and I don't know if you know, but the WGA will only allow a director to share writing credit if he brings over 50% original material. I don't know if he's done that or not. Maybe he has.
Q: You haven't read the script?
A: No, I haven't. The last draft I did see was an in-progress draft that was extremely close to the book and my script. He actually put things back from the book that I had left out, so it's possible that he can get credit for that as original material. I really can't evaluate until they shoot it.
Q: Do you think Neil Jordan is a good choice for director?
A: Well, I concurred in the choice, and was actually very excited about it. I had always loved The Company of Wolves. I mentioned it in the Vampire novels as one of the movies they watched. And I thought The Crying Game was amazing. My first choice would have been Ridley Scott, but he turned David Geffen down. David Cronenberg was also somebody I wanted badly, and I understand he turned it down. When I was presented with the idea of Neil Jordan, I thought, he's got courage, he isn't scared by gender, he loves to play with transcending gender and gender illusions and tricks. He'll know how to work with those characters without being afraid of their homo-erotic quality. I still have faith in Neil Jordan. I just don't know. The Tom Cruise casting is so bizarre, it's almost impossible to imagine how it's going to work, and it's really almost impossible to imagine how Neil and David and Tom could have come up with it. I have one question: Does Tom Cruise have any idea of what he's getting into? I'm not sure he does. I'm not sure he's read any of the books other than the first one, and his comments on TV that he wanted to do something scary and he loved "creature features" as a kid, well, that didn't make me feel any better. I do think Tom Cruise is a fine actor. [But] you have to know what you can do and what you can't do.
Q: Let's talk about who would have made a good Lestat.
A: Well, Jeremy Irons would have been fabulous.
Q: Too old.
A: Oh, but he looked so good in Damage. When an actor's that great and he has a voice that's that great and a face that's that great... he could have done the role. He would have to have been made up to look younger, and he would have to have had wild blond hair, but he could have done it. All these characters are supposed to be immortal and they're supposed to be preternatural, so I'm not sure really young people can play them with the kind of depth that Jeremy Irons had in Damage and Dead Ringers.
Q: Who else?
A: I think John Malkovich could have done it. Peter Weller I thought could make an interesting Lestat. Alexander Godunov, who was in Witness. They needed an overpowering person like that, very blond, very tall, very athletic, very full. I think Brad Pitt would be a fabulous Lestat. I tried for a long time to tell them that they should just reverse these roles--have Brad Pitt [who is cast as Louis] play Lestat and have Tom Cruise play Louis. Of course, they don't listen to me.
Q: So it's not just a bad dream, huh? Tom Cruise is really going to play Lestat?
A: Oh, the choice is just so bizarre. Yes, he could do Louis, he could do that part, the brooding, dark, guilt-ridden, passive, reflective, reactive thing. But here's Brad Pitt, he did that wonderful thing with his hips in Thelma & Louise, remember that? I've watched that performance over and over again. And A River Runs Through It, you know, the grave, religious male romance about fly-fishing? This is a guy who could play Lestat.
Q: I think Christopher Walken would have made a good Lestat.
A: I think he could have done it, too. I think sometimes he plays parts a little cooler than I wish he would. But I thought he looked spectacular in Batman Returns. I was a big fan of that movie.
Q: So what about when they were talking about Cher and Anjelica Huston to be Lestat?
A: Oh, my editor, Vicki Wilson, really wanted Anjelica Huston to be Lestat. I wrote the script in which Cher was supposed to play Louis, not Lestat. Julia Phillips and I were developing that together, and the whole idea was that Louis would be a transvestite woman. At that time in history, you could own your own plantation and run things if you were a man, [but] you couldn't if you were a woman. It was the French law. So this was a woman who dressed like a man, and otherwise it was exactly the same as Interview With the Vampire.
Q: How'd you hook up with Julia Phillips?
A: Julia was trying to buy the rights to The Vampire Lestat, and Paramount still had Interview, and we hooked up. I called her and we started to talk about everything from there on, and we had a great friendship for a long time. Julia's very intense and I think her future as a writer is going to be spectacular. And I think she can do her novels and free herself from the whole Hollywood thing.
Q: So why do you keep selling your books to Hollywood? I mean, you don't need the money.
A: Well, Interview I sold in '76 to Paramount, and then when it reverted back, Julia had The Vampire Lestat, and the contract that now exists was done for Julia. You know, it was us together. She was very much in communication with me, and would listen and run her ideas by me and vice versa. It was then inherited by Geffen. I always knew, theoretically, Julia could be fired, but Julia was the one that kept getting it together, so I never thought that would happen. But then she wrote things about Geffen [in her book, You'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again] that he perceived to be unkind and he fired her.
Q: What strikes me as funny is that Hollywood thinks of itself as so naughty, but there are things in your books that will never be shown on-screen.
A: Right. Unless I don't know what Neil Jordan is going to wind up doing with Interview With the Vampire.
Q: You've written some soft-core pornography...
A: It's hard-core.
Q: What's the difference?
A: By hard-core, I mean it is absolutely uncompromising. It contains the most detailed sex scenes that I knew how to write. I would imagine that soft porn means kind of blurring of the genitalia and stuff, and my stuff doesn't do that.
Q: No, it certainly doesn't. Let me read from Exit to Eden, which is also being made into a movie:
"She 'd picked up something from the dresser. It looked at first glance like a pair of flesh-colored, leather-clad horns. I opened my eyes to see it clearly. It was a dildo in the form of two penises joined at the base with a single scrotum...
'Don't do that to me. . .' I said. 'Don't push me,' she said cruelly, her eyes narrowing, and her hand flew up and smacked my face. "
A: Yeah, there's that. [Laughs] I wanted to really take it to the max. I wanted to take that fantasy and put it in a playful setting where somebody could enjoy all of that and get away from the gruesome headlines and reality.
Q: Exit to Eden is such a bizarre fantasy...
A: Well, what can I say? It's about a couple that are both involved in this S&M sort of redemptive force, that you can work out your sadomasochistic desires in a safe setting. But when they meet they fall in love and discover that they're so in love that the S&M toys and rituals no longer seem appropriate.
Q: You wrote that book as Anne Rampling...
A: I named myself after Charlotte Rampling, the actress. I loved her in The Night Porter, I thought that was a really great movie. Bizarre. I didn't want to publish Exit as Anne Rice. I thought that would be too confusing to my readers. They'd dash out after the Vampire books, and it would really be almost false advertising, because it was such a deviation from my regular stuff.
Q: And as A.N. Roquelaure, you wrote a set of books that recreate the Sleeping Beauty myth, but through S&M. People get spanked so often in these books that it's best to read them standing up... I'm speechless.
A: You shouldn't be. Those books, they spoke to a lot of people. In all my books, all the sex is consensual. Everybody knows exactly what they're getting into.
Q: Now they're making Exit to Eden into a film...
A: Yeah, Garry Marshall is directing that.
Q: [Laughter]
A: Well, it's actually not so surprising if you think of Exit to Eden as a love story, if you think of the intimate quality in that love story. I think that's what he's gonna focus on. And Paul Mercurio, the guy who's in Strictly Ballroom, is going to play Elliot, and Dana Delany is opposite him. And then there is Rosie O'Donnell and Dan Aykroyd as the second string comic couple, but I don't know about that.
Q: I'd be remiss if I didn't ask you this: Have you ever strapped on a double-dildo and fucked your husband, Stan?
A: [Much laughter] No, I haven't. But if I had, I probably wouldn't tell you. Well, maybe I would tell you, Martha, but the answer is that I never, ever have.
Q: Who straps on the dildo in the movie? That's all I want to know.
A: [Laughter] I don't know. I assume it will be Dana Delany, but I don't know if they'll show that. I made the decision to sell them the rights and then I backed off, because I'm not a collaborative artist. I can't stand throwing my heart into a script and then having people change it. Now the Beauty books I wouldn't sell, because I don't trust anybody to do those in a way I would necessarily approve of. They are total pornography.
Q: Have you watched a lot of pornography?
A: I don't care for it very much [so] I haven't watched a lot. My husband has a large collection of really wild pornography.
Q: What kind of stuff?
A: Oh, all kinds of funky X-rated films, homemade X-rated films, tapes made by lesbians, things like that.
Q: How do you feel about women who say that pornography degrades them?
A: Pornography is not the problem. And taking away pornography is not going to solve the problem. Pornography has its place in exploring the imagination. I would love to see women write more pornography. And men, too. I think through pornography we could understand more about our really basic fantasies. And I think our fantasies are a big mystery. I think the violence against women has to do with men, and I don't think they need any pornography to help.
Q: So you didn't believe Ted Bundy when he said that pornography drove him wild?
A: Ten minutes before he got electrocuted, he thought, Well, I'll make one last stab at getting out of here. He was trying to give some indication that he was worth studying if they'd just keep him alive, and I'm really glad they executed him.
Q: Where do you do your research? Have you been involved in S&M or do you have access to people who are heavily into it?
A: Only after the books were published. I was invited out a few times by some people in San Francisco and I did meet an interesting woman who had a whole armoire of whips and dildos and things. But the rest of it is my imagination. Oh, I have my friend John Preston, too. He's a gay pornographer, and my closest friend. But our relationship is mainly that of two writers. Other than that, I don't really know anybody else who's into S&M.
Q: You say you watch a lot of movies, so let's talk about the ones that you thought were erotic.
A: I've been influenced by films. I watch them so much because I'm a very slow reader, and when I want to unwind, I put a movie on. I find Tom Berenger and Kurt Russell just delightful to look at.
Q: Tom Berenger, huh?
A: Yeah, Tom Berenger has the greatest neck and chest. When I was writing The Witching Hour, I would take time off and watch Someone to Watch Over Me, just to base the character Michael on Tom Berenger. One of the sexiest things I ever saw was him walking around the apartment with the gun in Someone to Watch Over Me. I just loved it. Another movie I loved is Last Rites, where he plays the priest from St. Patrick's Cathedral. That scene where he gets into bed with that jezebel--I cannot sit still and watch that. I didn't think it was a great film, but I thought he did a fantastic job.
Q: Have you ever met him?
A: No, no. But when The Witching Hour came out, I asked CAA to send him a copy and say, "These characters are based on you."
Q: And you never heard from him?
A: No.
Q: Did you even go see Sliver because he was in it? That would show real devotion.
A: I saw it on disc. I thought it was very interesting. Again, it wasn't a great film. He's generally better than the films he's in.
Q: Did you watch him in At Play In the Fields of the Lord?
A: I was waiting for him to take his shirt off. I knew that would happen. But when he took off everything, I almost died. Kurt Russell is worth watching, just to see his arms. He was good in Backdraft. I thought that was a hilariously romantic film. You talk about male romance... A River Runs Through It was a fishing romance, Backdraft was a fireman's romance. As I get older I like looking at those kind of men. I just adore Arnold Schwarzenegger, I'll watch him in anything.
Q: Tom, Kurt... and Arnold?
A: I've written a book called The Mummy, and I wish--we have people interested in it and it's moving very slowly--but I wish Arnold Schwarzenegger would play that role. See, I think coming out of the wrappings as Ramses the Great with that terrific voice and that gorgeous physique, it'd be great. It would be something totally different for him. I've yet to see him in a film that I thought was really as good as he was. You know, he does films that I think are very easy for him. I'm sure he works extremely hard, but I would love to see him really have a juicy role.
Q: I'm sorry, but this Arnold thing, I can barely believe this.
A: Arnold's not what he seems. That's what I've been telling my mother-in-law. You've got to watch his films. The guy has this great sensitivity. The voice is beautiful. The mystery of that voice, and the compassion in his face, and the gentleness at the core... that's what does it. It's not what you think. The reason I wanted him so badly to play Ramses, too, is the voice. That's a very sexy thing to me, men's voices. I think Berenger's voice is just great. But to really refine this answer: Berenger is about the most erotic thing in film. I really do look at his films just to look at him. Someone to Watch Over Me is almost hard to watch, it's so erotic... it's Berenger porn!
Q: What other movies do you find sexy?
A: I thought Henry & June was very sensuous, and I particularly liked Uma Thurman. I thought Last Tango in Paris was wonderful. I think when you go back to Last Tango and films like that, the films of today seem very tame. That was a wild phase in film. Pretty Baby was a shocking film for me. I saw it again recently and felt uneasy, because of the way it uses Brooke Shields. I thought the TV show "Beauty and the Beast" was tremendously sexy. Linda Hamilton was wonderful and Ron Perlman is great. I think he could play the Mummy, too.
Q: You like the oddest actors.
A: They're all hunks. To me, this is not a superficial thing, this is a very deep, sensuous thing. At this point in my life, in novels like The Witching Hour, I'm describing that kind of man. I never did it in my earlier novels. I was describing Eric Roberts--whom I also love--or, you know, some ethereal figure that is part angel, part male. I'm really enjoying expanding in this way. This is just the pornographer in me talking, but I would love to make a film with Berenger.
Q: So, you hate Hollywood, but you love movies.
A: I love film, and I think my feelings about Hollywood are pretty much the feelings of many, many writers. You know, you go there and you think so much can be done, and then you start to discover how many people are messing around who don't know anything.
Q: What about Daniel Day-Lewis? Would he have made a good Lestat?
A: If he had played Lestat we wouldn't be in this dilemma, but he turned it down. Even then, I suggested to Neil Jordan that it be reversed, that Daniel Day-Lewis play Louis and Brad Pitt play Lestat, but I don't think he agreed with me. I'm not even sure he understood me. Neil Jordan, by the way, is extraordinarily nice, one of the most gentle, kind human beings. In fact, I fear for him in Hollywood. I don't know how somebody decent can survive with those panthers out there. I don't know.
Q: You haven't mentioned Bram Stoker's Dracula. What did you think of it?
A: I didn't care for it. I didn't think it was sexy at all. But I love Francis Coppola. I thought The Godfather was great, and I was hoping he'd give us a Godfather of vampire movies. But I don't think he took it seriously. He thought it was a fun thing that he could do anything with. And he did anything. He'd show a great image, and then everything would go wild, and the power of the image would be lost. And then another great image would come up, and it would be lost, and I just didn't get it. And why he chose for Gary Oldman to look like Glenn Close, I have no idea.
Q: Was Tim Burton ever going to do Interview With the Vampire!
A: No, but I did write a script last year, a remake of Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein, and we wanted very badly for Tim Burton to do that. I did have one meeting with him. He was very charming. I think he later decided not to do the project, but I have tremendous admiration for him.
Q: So, just to make sure the record's straight, what's the biggest reason Tom Cruise is no good to play Lestat?
A: I don't think I've ever fallen under the spell of an actor when the voice wasn't a big component, and of course the very sad thing about Tom Cruise is he does not have that kind of distinct voice. How is he possibly going to say those lines? How is he gonna exert the power of Lestat? Over and over in the books, I say, you know, Lestat's voice was purring in my ear, or the voice was like roughened velvet, and here's this actor with no voice. I don't know how it's gonna work. Maybe he will drop out.
Q: Are you a loose cannon? Are they trying to tell you to shut up already?
A: No, I got one call in the very beginning. Actually, my readers had been screaming for several weeks before I started. Some people were blaming me. "How could you let this happen?" So finally, when I was contacted by the L.A. Times, I said what was on my mind. After about three weeks of trying to live with it, I was sitting at my desk and I real¬ized I was just so angry at Neil Jordan that he'd let this happen, that I couldn't contain it any longer. I finally erupted in a conversation, but it had already blown like Vesuvius. It's not my doing. David Geffen doesn't know who Louis is or who Lestat is. Perhaps David's never even read Interview With the Vampire. I didn't ever get the impression that he had. Maybe at some point somebody read it to him, or he's heard the tape. They want you to believe in Hollywood that you need them, that they can change your life, and I think they're afraid of writers in some ways because they think they can't control us. There's a point where we can walk away. We don't need them, you know. If they say to me, you'll never eat lunch in this town again, my answer would be, do you promise? I don't want to ever eat lunch in this town!
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Martha Frankel interviewed Christopher Walken for the December 1993 Movieline.