The resurrection of the musical vampire: from the 19th century stage to The Vampire Lestat

Vampire musicals are finally getting their moment. In June, The Lost Boys won four Tony awards on Broadway, while AMC and BBC Two premiered the third season of Interview with the Vampire—now retitled The Vampire Lestat—featuring the French nobleman vampire as a rockstar. According to The Conversation, this marks a dramatic reversal. Vampire musicals from the early two-thousands—Dance of the Vampires, Dracula, and Lestat—all crashed on Broadway, undone by confused tone and hollow characters. But the new productions have cracked the code. The Lost Boys succeeds through spectacle: flying vampires, gothic grandeur, the full scope of an eighties megamusical. The Vampire Lestat, meanwhile, makes music integral to character—letting a soulless creature express the deep, authentic feelings that shouldn't be possible for a vampire, turning the genre's mythic contradiction into cathartic power. After years of Broadway disasters, musical vampires are finally thriving.

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