‘The Vampyre: Blood & Ink’ is my second screenplay – after “Little Fury” – and it was co-written by myself and Director Trisha Ward. It has stemmed from my love of gothic fiction and it was a curious case to me that this particular gem of gothic literature I had in mind to adapt into a screenplay – John Polidori’s iconic novella, “The Vampyre” – had not yet been made into a film. The novella is celebrated and is much loved worldwide, so we have painstakingly taken the time to adapt this incredible story – adding in some historical and biographical elements in order to compliment the main narrative of John’s gothic fantasy.
John Polidori is a much-overlooked writer in my opinion. He is the father of the written vampire legend and is the reason that ‘Dracula’, ‘Carmilla’ and even more modern renditions such as ‘Interview with a Vampire’ were written. All of these vampiric works of literature stem from Polidori’s determination to pen the first written piece of vampiric fiction….and yet if one says his name in the street….people ask, ‘who is that?’. And yet they know exactly who Bram Stoker, Mary Shelley and Lord Byron are. It is unfortunate really, that he does not receive credit for his work which has authentically fathered a literary legacy.
‘The Vampyre: Blood & Ink’ is essentially what we view to have been John’s own story and his pioneering journey of writing something that would begin a frenzied
desire for such genres in the masses of Georgian England. It is a story of one man’s descent into madness when his own creation takes over his sanity and ultimately leads to his early and tragic demise.
Rosanna Hamlin Writer 