"Interview With the Vampire": Lestat in the front yard with a boombox
Jeezus a lot was crammed into this one!
Quick note: Tuesday, November 8, is Election Day. So much is at stake in this year’s midterm elections—from reproductive and LGBTQ+ rights to election integrity. I’ve been covering this stuff for LGBTQ Nation since early this summer, so believe me when tell you, it’s a scary time right now, particularly for queer and trans people, not to mention women and people of color. It is essential that all of us who stand for progressive values get out and vote! The clock is ticking, so if you still need to figure out where to vote and get an idea of what’s on the ballot in your state, Vote Save America is an excellent resource. Please, if you’re registered and haven’t done so already, cast your vote on November 8. Ok, vampire stuff now!
I’ve alluded in previous recaps to the fact that, as much as I’m enjoying this version of Interview With the Vampire, as thrilled as I am to see any interpretation of these characters in any medium—except not Broadway; we do not speak of the Lestat musical which I never saw—and as genuinely good as I think the show is, I’ve been struggling to not constantly compare what’s happening in this version of the story to what I know is “supposed to” happen from the books. I keep wondering how the various changes the show has made are going to inevitably lead to what I know—or, you know, what I think I know—is coming next.
Like, for instance, this whole dropping Louis from the sky thing that happened at the end of Episode 5! How does that lead into—no spoilers—what I assume has to be the climax of the season???
Obviously, this is a terrible, no-good way to consume a work of…art? Content? But I can’t help it.
Anyway. Episode 6: Jeezus I feel like a lot was crammed into this one just to kinda get us back to basically where we were prior to Louis’s skydive!
Like, obviously, getting Louis and Lestat back together after what really felt like a definitive, no-comin-back-from-this violent end of their relationship. That’s basically half the episode: Lestat being all gorgeous and sexy and sorry of being an abusive psycho and trying to convince Louis that HE’S CHANGED! But then the second half is a full-on heel-turn, with Lestat being the absolute worst again. Which, actually, is totally Lestat’s thing, and also I guess is probably what being in a prolonged bad relationship is like?
But before we get to any of that, in 2022, all Daniel wants to talk about now is how Lestat could fly. “Like Superman???”
Louis is like, “No, jackass, not like Superman. Superman is a totally made-up person not a for-real vampire who exists!” Also, only senior gold-star vampires can fly, so shut up about it.
Meanwhile, there’s this human alive doctor in the Dubai penthouse giving Daniel his Parkinson’s medicine who really does not want to be in this show. “I’m not here! What’s a vampire? No comment!” the doctor keeps having to say. (Also, it’s daytime again and Louis is awake, which GAAAAHHH! is one of the dumb things I really can’t let go of! These dead dudes should not be awake during the day!)
Back in the past, Lestat has been out of the picture for months while Claudia has been nursing Louis back to dead health—which includes making him chase a live goat around their house to learn how to walk again. (I guess that racoon who was living with them last week was unavailable or already eaten?)
Then one night Lestat shows up outside their house with a boombox like, “I’m sorry, baby! I miss yooooooooou!” But Louis just throws his coffin out the second story window into the street. Which, good luck explaining that to the neighbors. (These vampires are so bad at discretion! How have they not been staked through the heart yet???)
Basically, Lestat spends six full years sending Louis gifts and apologies. One time it’s Downton Abbey’s motor car and also himself looking like gay sex on a putting green in this white polo shirt. Good god, I don’t think anyone has ever looked as hot in a polo as Sam Reid does in that scene! Then finally one night he sends Louis a record of a love song he wrote for him. Except he…had his mistress sing it…? Fuuuuucking Lestat, right?
Of course, this fully enrages Louis, but also I guess makes him horny for ol’ Lioncorpse Lestat, because he storms across the river to the floozy house where Lestat has been staying with his floozy girlfriend, Floozica or whatever her name is. Lestat is like, “GET LOST FLOOZICA!” And Louis and Lestat have violent hot gay sex and get back together, which is what we all want because we’re terrible brain damaged people.
Now that Lestat is moving back in with Louis and Claudia, they have all these new rules and conditions, which is 100% definitely something that Lestat is going to respond well to. These include 1) murder Floozica 2) Claudia is Lestat’s sister now, which supposedly makes a huge difference in their relationship I guess, and also 3) they want to know everything he’s been keeping secret from them.
So, Lestat tells them all about how one time in 1700s Paris, this creep named Magnus kidnapped him and locked him up in a tower with a bunch of corpses that all looked just like him before turning him into a vampire, giving him kajillions of ducket$$$, and then burning himself alive to death. Which was all v. traumatic for baby Lestat and is why he has abandonment issues.
Also, Louis agrees to start murdering people again because it makes Lestat and Claudia feel very judged that he only eats animal blood. And Lestat shows up one night with Floozica’s finger minus the rest of Floozica to prove that she is dead now. So, everyone’s making compromises.
Everyone except Claudia, who continues to extremely hate Lestat and is constantly trying to convince poor dick-matized Louis that he is a no good, lying, abusive jerk. When she’s not telepathically trying to get Louis to run away to Eastern Europe with her while he’s trying to concentrate on getting boned by Lestat, she’s badgering Lestat about this guy Nicky who he used to date in Dangerous Liaisons-times. But that guy is dead now, which is another thing that traumatized Lestat that he doesn’t want to talk about.
But Claudia is just like, “Boo hoo hoo, you sad dumb jerk!” Plus, she thinks Lestat really murdered Nicky, and also Magnus, and basically everyone he’s ever known, and is constantly lying about everything.
One thing he is definitely lying about is Floozica, that singer lady who was his sidepiece. She’s not really dead after all, and he’s still having straight sex with her all the time in her floozy shack! You’re like, “Wait tho! Whose finger was that?” It was hers! He convinced this dizzy bitch to CUT OFF HER OWN FINGER! She’s like, “Promises were made!” Which I guess means he told her he’d make her into a vampire someday?
Claudia is onto Lestat’s bullshit though, and she takes Louis to spy on them one night, which basically makes Louis lose his will to live.
And yet! For some reason he still refuses to run away to Europe with Claudia. He’s like, “Blah. Just go without me, I’m gonna stay here and maybe burn myself alive in the sun.” Womp womp. So, Claudia hops on a train to Translybulgaria to find Count Nosferatus.
Meanwhile, in present day, Louis reminds Danielle that this is where they left off in their 1970s interview. Which, twist? He’s like, “This is when you were like, GIMME THAT HOT VAMPIRE BLOOOOOOOOD!” And then he says he would totally give it to Danielle now. But Daniel, who is like literally dying of old age and career shambles in front of him or something, is just like, “Nah, pass!”
Ok, back to the story now: Louis comes home to find Lestat listening to the radio about how it’s World War II now. Also, he somehow found Claudia on that train and dragged her back home because otherwise Louis would be too miserable without her. So, Lestat, a white man, is back in full-on evil bastard mode basically keeping Claudia and Louis, his only two Black friends, as, uh…non-consensual housemates.
Which is why Claudia decides they have to murder him.
But that’s where we end our story for tonight because in 2022, Grandpa Daniel has fallen asleep on the couch due to the drugs that that doctor who definitely wasn’t there earlier totally didn’t give him.
Except one last thing: Daniel has a dream about that time he first met Louis in Gay San Francisco in 1970-whatever. But in the dream, guess who he dream-remembers was there too? Rashid!
WHHHHHAAAAATTTTTTTT? TWIST FOR REAL THIS TIME! What does this mean? Is Rashid also a vampire? But he was in the sun sometimes, right? So, some other type of immortal maybe? What kind??? I DON’T KNOW!!!!
Want to hear my maybe spoilery theory though? Ok, here it is: I’m wondering if maybe the show is going to futz around with the book order and maybe kinda do The Tale of the Body Thief concurrent with the rest of Interview With the Vampire, and Rashid is actually Lestat in a mortal body that Daniel maybe gets body-snatched into at some point (instead of David Talbot)??? Cause, like, spoiler (?): Doesn’t The Tale of the Body Thief basically end with an old white dude permanently inhabiting the body of a cute young brown guy? (Jeezus, Anne Rice!) But then why hasn’t Rashid aged since 1970s??? Ugh! THEORY RETRACTED!