MEMORIES:
BuckBrann02 remembers...Another wonderful horror classic! Bela was the perfect choice for the roll! In my book, he will always be Dracula! ... More »
Posted on 07/02/08
PHOTOS:
Cast:
Coach Driver... Bela Lugosi
Mina Seward ... Helen Chandler
Jonathan Harker... David Manners
Renfield ... Dwight Frye
Professor Abraham Van Helsing... Edward Van Sloan
Dr. Jack Seward... Herbert Bunston
Lucy Weston ... Frances Dade
Maid... Joan Standing
Martin... Charles K. Gerard
Coach Passenger... Nicholas Bela
Coach Passenger... Daisy Belmore
Harbor Master... Tod Browning
Briggs, a Nurse... Moon Carroll
Young Girl Passenger... Carla Laemmle
Coach Passenger... Donald Murphy
Grace, English Nurse... Josephine Velez
Innkeeper...Michael Visaroff
Studio:
Release History:
1936 - Dracula's Daughter
1943 - Son of Dracula
1944 - House of Frankenstein
1945 - House of Dracula
Universal Studios’ great 1930’s and ‘40’s run of horror films all started with one bloodthirsty Transylvanian count. The nightmarish world of vampirism leaped to life on the screen in Dracula, the film that made Universal the go-to studio for big-screen horror and turned the Hungarian actor Bela Lugosi into an international star. Lugosi, who had been playing Count Dracula on stage for three years, seemed the obvious choice for Director Tod Browning, whose film adaptation of Bram Stoker’s classic novel came out in 1931.
The movie did take some liberties with Stoker’s original tale. The film starts with Renfield, a young realtor, heading to the Borgo Pass. Destination: Count Dracula’s Transylvanian manse, where the superficially charming count needs Renfield to dot the I’s and cross the T’s on the paperwork for his purchase of a deserted London abbey. But that night, the count pays a fanged visit to Renfield’s room, and turns the hapless real estate agent into his vampiric servant. The ship on which the pair subsequently set sail for England turns into a boatload of death.
Arrived in London, Renfield is locked up as a madman, tended by Dr. Seward, while Dracula chats up Seward’s daughter, Mina, and her chum Lucy. Lucy surrenders totally to the count’s spell and is turned into yet another undead creature of the night. Dr. Seward calls in Professor Van Helsing, a Dutch expert who dramatically proclaims the evil doings the work of “Nosferatu, the undead, the vampire.”
Dracula is hundreds of years old and has the power to change into a wolf or bat. His lives off the blood he drinks from his victims’ necks; after he feeds, they are turned into his undead slaves. Van Helsing, with the help of Mina’s fiance, Jonathan Harker, confronts Dracula, trying to defeat the monster and save the soul of poor Mina, who has also fallen under the count’s spell.
The film’s shadowy, Gothic sets and imagery formed a perfect backdrop for Lugosi’s creepy, menacing shape and eerily exotic Hungarian accent. Audiences loved it and made it one of the year’s biggest screen successes. Universal followed up later that hear with Frankenstein and then an avalanche of horror classics that continued through the 1940’s.
The Count himself engendered a few sequels, including 1936’s Dracula’s Daughter, which opens with Van Helsing’s arrest for his part in what happened in the first movie. In another part of London, the mysterious Countess Marya Zaleska is having a big of a problem with Dracula – she wants out of her vampire curse, but at the same time she can’t resist the pull of the blood. The body count multiplies and Van Helsing returns for another hunt.
The final two sequels featured the Count himself, with John Carradine taking the role in House of Frankenstein (1944) and House of Dracula (1945). A triple monster battle, the two movies saw Dracula battling Frankenstein and the Wolf Man. While these two films marked the end of Universal’s Dracula run, the character reappeared in 100-plus more features, easily becoming one of moviedom’s most-filmed characters.
