A hand presses a cassette into a recorder and fiddles with a small microphone.
Malloy sits over a table fiddling with the tape. He is young, half-shaven, dressed in T shirt and jeans. He looks too --
LOUIS, who stands by the window, looking out on the streeet, with his
back to Mallowy. Louis is dressed in an
old-fashioned suit.
LOUIS
So you want me to tell you the story of my life...
MALLOY
That's what I do. I interview people. I collect lives. F.M. radio. F.F.R.C. I just interviewed a genuine hero, a cop who -
LOUIS
(quietly interrupting)
You'd have to have a lot of tape for my story. I've had a very unusual life.
MALLOY
So much the better. I've got a pocket full of tapes.
LOUIS
You followed me here, didn't you?
MALLOY
Saw you in the street outside. You seemed interesting. Is this where you live?
LOUIS
It's just a room...
MALLOY
So shall we begin?
(Playfully, almost teasing)
What do yo do?
LOUIS
I'm a vampire.
Malloy laughs.
MALLOY
See? I knew you were interesting. You mean this literally, I take it?
LOUIS
Absolutely. I was watching you watching me. I was waiting for you in that alleyway. And then you began to speak.
MALLOY
Well, what a lucky break for me.
LOUIS
Perhaps lucky for both of us.
Still in shadow he turns from the window and approaches the table.
LOUIS
I'll tell you my story. All of it. I'd like to do that very much.
Malloy is uneasy as he studies the shadowy figure, fascinated but afraid.
MALLOY
You were going to kill me? Drink my blood?
LOUIS
Yes but you needn't worry about that now. Things change.
Louis stands opposite, hand on the chair. Malloy is riveted.
MALLOY
You believe this, don't you? That you're a vampire? You really think...
LOUIS
We can't begin this way. Let me turn on the light.
MALLOY
But I thought vampires didn't like the light.
LOUIS
We love it. I only wanted to prepare you.
Louis pulls the chord of the overhead naked light bulb.
LOUIS' FACE
appears inhumanly white, eyes glittering. Inhuman or not alive. the
effect is subtle, beautiful and ghastly.
MALLOY
Good God!
He struggles to suppress fear and understand.
LOUIS
Don't be frightened. I want this opportunity.
The light appears to go out by itself and suddenly Louis is in the chair,
dimly lit by the street-light from the window.
The cassette is turning.
MALLOY
How did you do that?
LOUIS
The same way you do it. A series of simple gestures. Only I moved too
fast for you to see. I'm flesh and blood, you see. But
not human. I haven't been human for two hundred years.
Malloy is speechless, frightened yet enthralled.
LOUIS
What can I do to put you at ease? Shall we begin like David Copperfield?
I am born, I grow up. Or shall we begin when I was
born to darkness, as I call it. That's really where we should start,
don't you think?
MALLOY
You're not lying to me, are you?
LOUIS
Why should I lie? 1791 was the year it happened. I was twenty-four - younger than you are now.
MALLOY
Yes.
LOUIS
But times were different then. I was a man at that age. The master of a large plantation just south of New Orleans...
DISSOLVE TO:
EXT. LOUISIANA. DAY. (1791)
A dishevelled Louis, hair in pigtail, in deep pocket frock coat, rides
his horse through the fields of indigo, passing an
overseer and slaves at work.
He passes slave quarters and the distant colonial mansion of Pointe du Lac.
He comes to a small parish church and a graveyard. he dismounts and
walks through the tombs to an elaborate one in
Greek Style.
LOUIS (V.O.)
I had just lost my wife in childbirth. She and the infant had been buried less than half a year.
There is a marble angel above the tomb, feminine, with a tiny cherub
angel in her arms. Louis looks from the angel,
down to the inscriptions on the tomb:
DIANNE DE POINTE DU LAC 1763 - 1791
INFANT JEAN MARIE - 1791
Louis rps away the vines already covering the inscription, then drinks from a pocket-flask. His face is ashen.
LOUIS (VO)
I was twenty-four and life seemed finished. I couldn't bear the pain of thier loss. I longed for a release from it.
INT. WATERFRONT TAVERN. NIGHT.
Louis in ragged lace and dirty brocade sitting between two whores at
a gaming table, drinking absinthe. All around
him flatboatmen, whores, gamblers, black african freedmen.
LOUIS (VO)
I wanted to lose everything. My wealth, my estate, my sanity. But Lady Luck didn't oblige.
Louis dsiplays a hand of four aces. A gambler at the table stands in fury, over turning money, cards, drinks.
LOUIS
You're calling me a cheat?
GAMBLER I'm calling you a piece of shit -
The gambler pulls out a pearl-handled pistol and points it at Louis.
The crowd hushes and draws back. Louis smiles
drunkenly and stands. he rips open his lace shirt, exposing his chest.
LOUIS
Then do me a favour. Get rid of this piece of shit...
The gambler's finger on the trigger. His hand shakes.
LOUIS
You lack the courage of your convictions, sir. Do it.
LESTAT, a hooded figure in the corner, smiles from beneath the shadow of his hood. Gleaming blue eyes.
LOUIS (VO)
Most of all I longed for death. I know that now. I invited it, a release from the pain of living...
The gambler lowers his gun, scowling. Louis pockets the fistfulls of coins he has won.
EXT. WATERFRONT. NIGHT.
Loud, crowded riverfront taverns full of ruffians. Louis staggers down,
an arm around a whore, drinking from a
bottle. A pockmarked pimp follows behind.
LOUIS
My invitation was open to anyone. Sailors, thieves, whores and slaves...
EXT. WHARF. NIGHT.
Louis, quite insensible, being propped up against a wall by the whore
in a dank wharf over the water. The pimp rifles
his pockets, then pulss a knife, about to slice his throat, when a
shadow falls over him. He turns, and we see the face of
Lestat, who lifts him into the air by his throat, breaking his neck.
the whore screams and Lestat's other hand clamps
over her mouth. Lestat drags her towards him. Louis falls to the ground,
supported no more, insensible. Close on his
face, as we hear the last breaths of life of the whore, off.
LOUIS (VO)
But it was a vampire that accepted.
IN THE WATER -
The bodies of the thief and whore float by. Above on the wharf, Louis,
now awake, stares down at them. He turns, to
see Lestat, towering above him.
LESTAT
They would have killed you -
LOUIS
Then my luck would have changed.
LESTAT
You want death? Is it death you want?
LOUIS
Yes...
Lestat floats down on top of him, then lifts him in the air, draws his
head back by the hair and sinks his teeth in his
neck.
ON LOUIS' FACE - every muscle rigid, teeth clenched, as the blood is drained from him.
ON THIER FEET - hovering above the ground, like two quivering dancers.
THE WIND - billows through the ghostly white sails and rigging of the boats around the wharf.
LESTAT - floats higher, with Louis in his arms, draining his blood.
One hand reaches out and grips a rope, hanging
from a shipmast. The other holds Louis. He withdraws his teeth, and
looks into Louis' drained face.
LESTAT
You still want death? Or have you tasted it enough?
Louis can barely get the words out.
LOUIS
Enough...
Lestat smiles and lets him go. Louis falls and plummets into the water below.
LOUIS' FACE - coming to the surface, in the water lapping by the wharf.
The bodies of the whore and thief float
beside him. He looks up and sees Lestat way above him, dangling from
the rope of the shipmast.
INT. ROOM. SAN FRANCISCO.
ON MALLOY'S FACE
captivated, terrified, enthralled.
MALLOY
That's how it happened?
LOUIS
No. The Gift of Darkness requires more than that, as you'll see.
EXT. WATERFRONT. DAY.
Louis floating by mudflats, surrounded by dead fish, the carcases of
animals, eighteenth century rubbish. He gets to his
feet and walks weakly through the mudflats. The sun is coming up over
the sea behind him.
LOUIS (VO)
He left me half dead that morning. he wanted something from me. He came back the following night.
INT. LAVISH FRENCH-FURNISHED BEDROOM AT POINT DU LAC.
Louis is delerious in a four-poster bed, shrouded with mosquito netting.
A female slave, YVETTE, bathes his face with
a rag. She is crying. Other slave women hover in the shadows. Yvette
puts out all candles save one by the bed, and
withdraws, with the others.
Candlelight flickers on the face of the bisque virgin.
Louis tosses and turns, dreaming, murmuring incoherently. Then he opens his eyes.
LESTAT, exquisitely dressed in French clothing, stands by the bed smiling.
In the light of the candle we see that he is
not human; skin too white; eyes too bright. Lestat looks amiable, even
mischevious, but impossible - and angel or
monster.
Louis grabs his pistol from the table and cocks it.
LOUIS
Who the hell are you? What are you doing in my house?
LESTAT
And a beautiful house it is too. Yours is a good life, isn't it?
Louis takes aim. Lestat puts his hand over the barrel. Louis fires.
The bullet tears a hole in Lestat's hand. Lestat is
unfazed. He takes the gun from Louis' hand and throws it away. His
hand begins to heal.
LESTAT
You're not afraid of anything, are you?
LOUIS
Why should I be?
Louis reaches for his sword, hanging by the bed, and point it. Lestat laughs indulgently. He draws closer.
LESTAT
Are you going to put that through me too? Ruin my beautiful clothes?
He comes closer to Louis, right up to his face, so the sword passes through his waistcoat.
LESTAT
Were all last night's promises for nothing?
He reaches out with his now-healed hand and plucks out the sword.
LOUIS
What do you want from me?
LESTAT
I've come to answer your prayers. You want to die, don't you? Life has no meaning anymore, does it?
Lestat sits down on the bed, drawing up one knee. Louis is becoming spellbound.
LESTAT
The wine has no taste. The food sickens you. There seems no reason for
any of it, does there? But what if I could give it back
to you? Pluck out the pain and give you another life? And it would
be for all time? And sickeness and death could never touch
you again?
The vampire theme rises, with the sound of a heartbeat. Dissolve to:
EXT. GRAVEYARD. NIGHT.
The camera drifts through the graveyard where Louis' wife is buring.
Everything is lit with an eery glow, as if seen
through some unearthly eye.
LESTAT
Vampires, that's what we are. Creatures of darkness, only we see it
that darkness more clearly than any mortal has ever seen...
Louis and Lestat drifting, dreamlike, through the overhanging vines,
comes to the grave of his wife and child. Above
the crypt, the statue of angel, mother and child.
LESTAT
Wouldn't it be sweet to bid pain goodbye? To wave away anguish and grief? To embrace the peace of the unending night?
The marble fingers of the child on the statue move. The angel raises
her head and has the face of Louis wife, Diane.
she raises her hand and touches Louis tear-streamed face. The child
speaks.
MARBLE CHILD
Papa...
Louis reaches out to embrace them and finds himself touching cold marble. He cries out in anguish-
LOUIS
Diane!!!!
LESTAT
They are gone, Louis. Death took them. Death which you can now destroy...
LOUIS
NO!!!!!
INT. LOUIS BEDROOM. NIGHT.
Louis, thrashing on the bed in a delerium. Lestat places a hand on his forehead and soothes him.
LESTAT
You have to ask me for this. You have to want it, do you hear me?
LOUIS
Give it to me!!!
LESTAT
Vampires. We thrive on blood.
LOUIS
I want it!
Lestat bends close as if to drink Louis' blood. Louis does not shrink
back, but stares into his eyes. Lestat draws back,
then stands up and goes to the French doors.
LESTAT
Tomorrow night. You must prove yourself. I will give you the choice I never had.
He looks outside.
LESTAT
The sun's coming up. Watch it carefully. If you come with me tomorrow, you'll never see it again.
He leaves. Louis sits dazed, staring at the empty French window. The
sun rises with unnatural beauty, over the
swamplands and the plantation, filling the room, striking water-pitcher,
glass, mirror, and the picture of his dead wife.
LOUIS (VO)
My last sunrise. That morning I was not yet a vampire, and I saw my
last sunrise. I remember it completely, yet I don't
remember any sunrise before it. I watched the whole magnificence of
the dawn for the last time, as if it were the first. And the I
said goodbye to sunlight and went out to become what I became.
EXT. PLANTATION. NIGHT.
Lestat and Louis walk through the slave quarters, huddles groups around
fires, music, singing. The sound of whipping
is heard.
&nb sp; LESTAT
Your grief has unhinged you. You've let your estate rot.
In the woods beyond the quarters, the white overseer is whipping a black slave, with horrifying savagery.
LESTAT
You let your overseer run riot, work your slaves to the bone. We'll start with him.
LOUIS
How do you mean, start?
LESTAT
Call him.
Louis calls.
LOUIS
Carlos!!!
The overseer turns and comes towards them, with the bloodied whip.
LESTAT
Why the bloody whip, Carlos?
The overseer looks into his eyes, shivers with terror, drops the whip
and runs for the trees. Lestat is on him in an
instant. He sinks is teeth in his neck. Louis runs to him, tries to
pull him off. But Lestat turns to Louis and smiles, with
his bloodied mouth.
LESTAT
Let's call that a start.
LOUIS
I can't do it.
LESTAT
You've just done it -
LOUIS
Kill me if you will, but I can't do this...
He flees, as Lestat ends to finish off the overseer.
EXT. POINTE DU LAC. NIGHT.
Louis running up the steps leading to the gallery. He is crazed with guilt. He looks up and sees -
LESTAT --
Sitting collected at the head of the steps.
LOUIS
Backs away as Lestat rises and descends the steps so fluidly he hardly seems to move.
LESTAT
Don't worry. He was white trash, they come at two a penny. I dumped
him in the swamp and untied the slave, licked his
wounds clean.
LOUIS
You're the devil, aren't you? That's who you are.
LESTAT (GENTLY)
I wish I were. But if I were, what would I want with you?
LOUIS
I can't go through with it, I tell you.
LESTAT
Your perfect. Your bitter and you're strong.
LOUIS
But why do you want me?
LESTAT
Because you're as strong as I was when I was alive.
Louis takes out his flask and drinks. Drunkely, he turns and heads for a nearby swamp.
EXT. CEMETERY. NIGHT.
Louis stops again in front of the crypt. Drinks from the flask, leans his forehead against the stone.
Lestat appears beside him, radiant, beautiful.
LESTAT
You really want to be with them?
LOUIS
Yes. Kill me. Kill me like you promised -
LESTAT
You asked for death. I didn't promise it -
In a quiet rage, Lestat raise his fist and shatters the marble face
stone, revealing a coffin below. His fist shatters that
in turn, revealing the half-rotted body of a women, holding an infant,
no longer recognisable as individuals, a tangle of
gruesome rotted hair, flesh, eaten away lace, insects and worms crawling
over it.
Louis gasps.
LESTAT
It's not your wife and child my friend. It's death. Just that simple. Think and choose. It happens to everyone. Except us.
Lestat stares at him, smiling, becoming a hazy dreamlike vision, then
hyperclear. Louis again is spellbound. He drops
the flask, which shatters on the stones.
Lestat appears angelic in his radiance.
LESTAT
We shall be this way always, my friend. Young as we are now. I'm lonely
for a companion, lonely for your strength. But I'm not
that lonely. Do you want to come or not?
Louis capitulates in one long sigh.
LOUIS
Yes...
Lestat comes closer, smiling.
LESTAT
Did I hear a yes?
LOUIS
Yes...
Lestat embraces Louis, obscuring his face. He drinks his blood. We hear
two heartbeats, out of sync, coming together.
We see Louis' face, growing paler, paler, as his blood is drained.
His eyes stare upwards, losing thier focus.
LOUIS POV --
The moon, through hanging vines. The marble statue of his wife and
child smile at him, as if come alive. Her hair
blows in the breeze, wonderful gold tresses, the child's fingers reach
out...
BACK TO SCENE
Lestat lets Louis fall down beside the broken crypt. Louis looks from
the rotting bodies to Lestat above him. radiant.
Lestat speaks gently.
LESTAT
I've drained you to the point of death. If you drink from me you live for ever. If I leave you here you die.
Lestat lifts his hand to his lips and blows Louis a kiss.