Matthew Amendt on How the New Off-Broadway Dracula Is More Ghostbusters Than Twilight
Matthew Amendt (Photos by Emilio Madrid for Broadway.com) Matthew Amendt made his stage debut when he was a baby. His mom was a high school drama teacher in Indiana, Pennsylvania (which is also Jimmy Stewart’s hometown). “I was the prop baby in all the local high school productions,” he told Beth Stevens in a recent #LiveAtFive interview. Now Amendt is eating babies and biting necks in a new off-Broadway adaptation of Dracula, written by Kate Hamill and directed by Sarna Lapine. Jessica Frances Dukes and Matthew Amendt in Dracula.(Photo: Joan Marcus) Don’t expect a sexy vampire, says Amendt. “The original story, that’s really a creepy misogynist story of [Dracula] getting these young women, and they misbehave with me which kills them,” he explained. “Kate’s put her twist on that and changed all that.” In this new version, instead of Jonathan Harker as the main character, it’s actually his wife Mina who helps solve the Dracula mystery. Another twist: a majority of the cast is women.Since Dracula uses his vampirism as mind control, he becomes another tool of the patriarchy to control women. The question the play leaves audiences with is: Can you ever defeat Dracula and what he represents? “Are we gonna be able to solve these problems that we have with misogyny and gender and the patriarchy?” posits Amendt. “Are we gonna be able to figure these things out, or is it just something that we all inherited, a kind of plague, that’s gonna be a problem forever? My Dracula is kind of representing that. So, it’s a little more American Psycho than Monster.” Star Files Dracula Matthew Amendt
Show Closed This production ended its run on March 8, 2020 Related Shows View Comments Dracula is currently running in repertory with a new version of Frankenstein at Classic Stage Company, a kind of “double creature feature,” until March 8. It may sound like a dark program, but Amendt promises that it’s also a fun time, since the Dracula team was also inspired by Ghostbusters. As he put it, the goal is: “Let’s have a good amount of fun, let’s bite some people, let’s hiss at them, and let’s try to leave you with your partner in the Uber on the way home wondering if one of you is a vampire.”Watch the rest of Amendt’s #LiveAtFive interview below, where he also talks about why he loves doing Shakespeare. Video Player is loading.Play VideoPlayMuteCurrent Time 0:00/Duration 19:47Loaded: 0%Stream Type LIVESeek to live, currently playing liveLIVERemaining Time -19:47 Playback Rate1xChaptersChaptersDescriptionsdescriptions off, selectedCaptionscaptions settings, opens captions settings dialogcaptions off, selectedEnglishAudio Tracken (Main), selectedFullscreenThis is a modal window.Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window.TextColorWhiteBlackRedGreenBlueYellowMagentaCyanTransparencyOpaqueSemi-TransparentBackgroundColorBlackWhiteRedGreenBlueYellowMagentaCyanTransparencyOpaqueSemi-TransparentTransparentWindowColorBlackWhiteRedGreenBlueYellowMagentaCyanTransparencyTransparentSemi-TransparentOpaqueFont Size50%75%100%125%150%175%200%300%400%Text Edge StyleNoneRaisedDepressedUniformDropshadowFont FamilyProportional Sans-SerifMonospace Sans-SerifProportional SerifMonospace SerifCasualScriptSmall CapsReset restore all settings to the default valuesDoneClose Modal DialogEnd of dialog window.Close Modal DialogThis is a modal window. This modal can be closed by pressing the Escape key or activating the close button.