Amy Heckerling Talks Vamps and More!

Steve Barton |

Apr 9, 2012

Source Name:

New York Magazine’s Vulture

Source Url:

http://www.vulture.com/2012/04/vamps-amy-heckerling-interview.html

Post Thumb:

/sep11/vamposs.jpg

Amy Heckerling’s new horror comedy Vamps recently screened as part of the BAMcinématek series this past Saturday, and Heckerling had a lot to say about blood, Twilight, and more! Read on.

After the public Q&A (which was described as “awkward”), New York Magazine’s Vulture caught up with Heckerling, who had lots more to add. See the highlights below.

How her vamps sustain themselves…

“The idea was that you live on blood, but it doesn’t have to be human — although human is probably way enticing, which is why Goody [Silverstone’s character] is tempted by the drummer’s nose bleed. And it can’t be blood that’s old or stored, it’s got to be flowing. Blood probably tastes like salty water, right? You’ve cut yourself and tasted it, right? If you take the blood-drinking out of the equation, it’s just about sublimation of sex. I was more interested in eternally young, fun-loving people from different time periods.”

On the film’s budgetary issues, which resulted in her changing up a couple of scenes…

“I wanted it to start with this fantasy, this dream on the beach, where Krysten Ritter’s character is seeing all these bloated, big-tits, big-lips, big-pecs people that are beach people, super tan — like a beach movie gone scary. And it would be the reverse of Carnival of Souls so it’s the beach-y people chasing and horrifying the pasty, white person. And then they’re all looming over her when she wakes up in her coffin: “Oh, I had the worst nightmare!” And I wanted Alicia’s character [who has been a vampire since the nineteenth century] to be more incorporated into the history of New York…”

And finally, the Twilight phenomenon…

“I just don’t like when they have vampires outside [in the daylight] and they sparkle and seem so fey. They seem so precious. Daylight, that’s got to be a complete no-no; otherwise you might as well have some other kind of monster. It’s the dark. It’s the other side, when everyone else is asleep.”

Check out the link below for the whole enchilada.

Alicia Silverstone, Krysten Ritter, Sigourney Weaver, Richard Lewis, Kristen Johnston, Wallace Shawn, Justin Kirk, Dan Stevens, Marilu Henner, Zak Orth, Malcolm McDowell, and Todd Barry are all on tap for a little blood-sucking madness and mayhem in the flick that finds McDowell playing Vlad the Impaler, aka Dracula!

Written and directed by Heckerling, Vamps tells the modern day tale of two young beautiful female vampires (Alicia Silvestone, Krysten Ritter) living the good nightlife in New York until love enters the picture and each has to make a choice that will jeopardize her immortality.