Good news for Anne Rice fans! Universal Pictures has just acquired the movie rights to the author’s The Vampire Chronicles series.
Interview with the Vampire and Queen of the Damned may have made Warner Brothers the big bucks when they were first adapted for the big screen in 1994 and 2002 respectively, but now, Universal Pictures has announced plans that could see Anne Rice’s entire Vampire Chronicles series adapted into film.
In an announcement made on Thursday, Universal revealed that the movie rights deal will find Imagine Entertainment distributing the films and Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci producing.
The studio also added that the deal features plans to adapt screenplays for all the books in Anne Rice’s popular Vampire series, including Interview with the Vampire, Queen of the Damned, and her upcoming book Prince Lestat. Tale of the Body Thief, written by Rice’s son Christopher Rice, will also see an adapted screenplay as part of the new movie rights deal.
Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles follows the story of Lestat de Lioncourt– a french aristocrat who became a vampire in the late 18th century. Rice published the first book in her series, Interview with the Vampire in 1976, before going on to publish The Queen of the Damned in 1988, Memnoch the Devil in 1995, The Vampire Armand in 1998, Merrick in 2000, Blood and Gold in 2001, and Blackwood Farm in 2002, Blood Canticle in 2003.
Christopher Rice’s book, The Tale of the Body Thief was released in 1992, and the newest in the series, Prince Lestat is set to be released later this year.