Yahoo News Sink your teeth into a first look at vampire series Let the Right One In
There is something seemingly deathless about the appeal of Swedish author John Ajvide Lindqvist's 2004 novel Let the Right One In. That's appropriate given the tale centers on the relationship between a bullied boy and a vampire girl. The book has already been adapted into two films with, first, Swedish filmmaker Tomas Alfredson overseeing 2008's and, then, The Batman director Matt Reeves bringing audiences 2010's Let Me In. Now, Showtime is breathing fresh life into the novel with a New York-set TV show which will premiere this fall.
"The [original] film is about a relationship between an isolated bullied boy and an isolated lonely girl, who we learn is a vampire," says showrunner Andrew Hinderaker. "What I found so compelling about that film is there's a much smaller relationship between the vampire and [her] adult caretaker. I really used the film as inspiration for a story that really focuses on a 12-year-old girl who has been a vampire for 10 years. She has been taken care of by her father, who keeps her alive, who keeps them ahead of the law, and who has kept hope alive for both of them that one day they will find a cure and this won't be her life always."
Francisco Roman/Showtime Ian Foreman as Isaiah and Madison Taylor Baez as Eleanor in 'Let the Right One In'
Madison Taylor Baez plays the young vampire, Eleanor Kane, while The Hateful Eight actor Demián Bichir portrays her father, Mark.
"This is the story of a father and his daughter and all the obstacles they have to conquer and overcome in order to keep themselves alive," says Bichir. "Mark's daughter has been infected, so to speak, with a very, very strange and terrible virus, disease, however you want to call it. I'm saying [it like] this because, to me, this story goes beyond any vampire story. To me, this is about many other things that we're actually experiencing. It's about how difficult it is in any society for anyone to be different and to try to fit in."
The show's first episode finds Mark and Eleanor moving into a New York apartment. Their immediate neighbors are a cop named Naomi Cole (Anika Noni Rose) and her son Isaiah (Ian Foreman), who inadvertently risks life and limb (not to mention his neck!) by befriending Eleanor.
"It was important to me to aspire to capture the spirit of the film and for the show to be a love letter to it," says Hinderaker. "In the film, there is that relationship between the two children that is so pivotal in terms of what makes it iconic, what makes it so beautiful. So, this father and daughter move next door to another 12-year-old child, Isaiah, a boy who is isolated and bullied. Isaiah and Madison, our vampire, form a truly powerful and precarious friendship that's made all the more precarious because Isaiah's mother is a homicide detective."
The show's filming took place in New York and involved both freezing weather and many night shoots.
"It's a difficult story, it's a dark story, we were shooting mostly in the winter, that makes the whole thing very very difficult," says the Mexico-born Bichir, who is also a producer on the show. "But you know, when you're an actor in Mexico everything else is like a walk in the park. It's like driving. If you drive in Mexico City, oh, you're ready for any city on the planet!"
The cast of Let the Right One In also includes Grace Gummer, Kevin Carroll, Jacob Buster, Nick Stahl, and Željko Ivanek. The show is produced by Tomorrow Studios.
See exclusive first-look images from Let the Right One In above and below.
Francisco Roman/Showtime Madison Taylor Baez as Eleanor and Demián Bichir as Mark in 'Let the Right One In'
Francisco Roman/Showtime Madison Taylor Baez and Demián Bichir in 'Let the Right One In'
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