Interview With The Vampire received more than a facelift with AMC‘s TV series. The series, although based upon Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles like the movie was, feels like an entirely different beast. In contrast to Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt’s portrayal of the leading duo, Sam Reid and Jacob Anderson crackle with electricity as Lestat de Lioncourt and Louis de Pointe du Lac. Their willingness to lean into their chemistry has taken the show into gloriously bawdy territory as the writers have been updating the story for a modern audience, which is also growing after the show landed on Netflix.
Is it funny that Louis, a damn vampire, was hiding out in Dubai as part of the show’s “interview” framework? For sure. That absurdity has only continued with Lestat going full-out camp, which should bode well for his next incarnation in the third season of this wildly embraced series.
Plot
Above all, it is certain that Sam Reid will also be able to top Tom Cruise at the rock star game (i.e., Rock Of Ages) in addition to being a vampire. We’ll get there in a moment.
As viewers know, the second season finale included a gorgeous reconciliation in between Louis and Lestat as they processed the death of Claudia (Delainey Hayles, who replaced Bailey Bass) and beautifully reconciled, and Louis also reconciled with his own status as vampire.
That could have been the end of the series (the episode was actually titled, “And That’s The End of It. There’s Nothing Else”), but (presumably) since the audience is so passionate for this show, AMC announced a third season of debauchery. With that said, get ready for the series to move into another Anne Rice novel, The Vampire Lestat, which means that we should look forward to diving back into the seductive one’s origins and previous interactions with Armand. How that will take shape remains a mystery, since this series has already made key story changes regarding Armand and Louis, so further changes from Rice’s source matter could be at work.
We will formally enter Lestat’s Rock Star Era, as the synopsis further indicates:
In Season 3, resentful of the perfunctory portrayal in the trashy bestseller “Interview With The Vampire,” the Vampire Lestat sets his story straight in a way only the Vampire Lestat can — by starting a band and going on tour. Gabrielle. Nicholas. Magnus. Marius. Those Who Must Be Kept. They join Louis, Armand, Molloy, Sam, Raglan, Fareed and others we can’t tell you about yet on a sexy pilgrimage across space, time and trauma. No Auto-Tuning. No Trigger Warnings. All Feels Amplified.
Trailer
Although no full trailer exists yet, AMC has teased Lestat as a rock star. He’s as spoiled and as much of a diva as you could possibly imagine, and the top YouTube comment is as follows: “oh my god he’s in his rockstar cocaine manic pixie girl phase SLAY.” Accurate.
Reid is clearly having a blast with Lestat’s amped-up diva-ness, and his “Justin Bieber” and “your soundman is dehydrated” are only the beginning. Following this teaser, speculation has abounded that this season will be largely told in a “rockumentary”-style manner (possibly with Daniel doing the interviewing again), and that the fourth season could adapt Rice’s Queen of the Damned. With that said, Screenrant noticed that the watered-down Lestat photocopy (the silent character who sits in the interview chair before he is booted in favor of Lestat) likely isn’t simply a chair placeholder. Rather, he represents the Lestat that appeared in the 2002 Queen of the Damned movie adaptation. In any event, the strange and silent figure doesn’t hold a candle to AMC’s Lestat or Sam Reid’s impeccable and fabulous performance.
Of course, there’s a lyric video that exists, too.
Cast
Sam Reid (Lestat), Jacob Anderson (Louis), Assad Zaman (Armand), Daniel Malloy (Eric Bogosian), Justin Kirk (Raglan), and Gopal Divan (Fareed) will return, and AMC has teased that many cast additions will be announced. This will include Lestat’s band members, and please let this be a real-life band having a grand time with alter egos.
Release Date
AMC has stayed closed lipped, perhaps preferring to nurse the Lestat Mystique. However, late 2025 is likely the plan, since that would match up to the gap between the first two seasons (October 2022 and May 2024)
Currently, AMC hasn’t provided a release date, but the first and second seasons landed in October 2022 and May 2024, respectively, so late 2025 is entirely possible. They could even swing a Halloween season release, but first, if you missed the promised crossover on Mayfair Witches, that episode is there for the taking over on AMC+.