AMC+ "Interview with the Vampire"

Anne Rice's

Interview with the Vampire

AMC+ The Vampire Chronicles

In the year 2022, the vampire Louis de Pointe du Lac lives in Dubai and seeks to tell the story of his life or afterlife to renowned journalist Daniel Molloy. Beginning in early 20th-century New Orleans, Louis' story follows his relationship with the vampire Lestat du Lioncourt and their formed family, including teen fledgling Claudia. Together, the vampire family endures immortality in New Orleans and beyond. As the interview continues in Dubai, Molloy discovers the truths beneath Louis' story.

The story of Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire is adapted from The Vampire Chronicles and follows closely to the original plot of a tormented vampire from New Orleans reuniting with a dedicated reporter to recount a life of bloodshed and toxic romance with the sinister Frenchman who turned him.

Although the original Anne Rice novel did not place the characters Louis and Lestat in the Storyville District circa 1910, the television adaptation placed the opening storyline smack dab in the center of Storyville by building 40 period-authentic building façades on a backlot at The Ranch Studios in Chalmette, including one for Tom Anderson’s Fair Play Saloon.

Since Storyville was shut down in 1917, only the streets still exist, but the vast majority of the buildings that served as saloons and brothels during its heyday are long gone. The showrunners did not want to dress the streets of the French Quarter and fail honoring the historic red-light district, therefore the crew headed to The Ranch Studios in Chalmette, a 22-acre facility on Judge Perez Drive that was transformed into a recreation of two Storyville streets: Iberville and Liberty.

“Storyville has always been this elusive, mysterious place, because it doesn’t exist (anymore). It’s such a huge part of our culture here. There’s so much that gestated and came out of this weird social experiment,” said Mara LaPere-Schloop, who helped re-create a version of the legendary red-light district as the production designer on AMC’s ‘Interview with the Vampire’.”

“Some of the façades are exact replicas of those brothels if you can find photographs,” LaPere-Schloop said. “Others were appropriately re-created from other parts of those neighborhoods and we slotted them in.”

“It’s such a gift when you get to work in a place you love and celebrate it,” she said. “I was really committed to, as much as we could, capturing the essence of New Orleans but also capturing the essence of Anne Rice’s New Orleans.

“As a design exercise, things like this are a total dream, where you get to build these playgrounds and really get to dive into the history of a place I really adore. It really was fantastic.”

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