Mark Gatiss & Steven Moffats DRACULA- a critical review

Since the 1970s, I have been a fan of the novel DRACULA, that was written a good 80 years before by Bram Stoker and that has become a literary masterpiece of gothic horror. The book has been so successful that it has kept people reading it for more than 100 years now and even though people will now smirk at the oldfashioned English in which it was written, the message of the horror in it is still conveyed with absolute and terrifying success.

Claes Bang as Dracula and Dolly Wells as Agatha van Helsing

I am very glad that the book still manages to horrify readers even today. For that is the only reason people will tend to forget the bad adaptations we so often get over the years. The recent BBC production created by Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat is unfortunately a good example of such a horrifyingly bad adaptation.  Simply called DRACULA, this version is told in three parts, only the first of which barely follows the original story. Alas Moffat and Gatiss think they are being clever in trying to get the count to 2020's London in the most outlandish of ways.  But they only manage to lose the original story to such a ludicrous extent that I would hesitate to even call this farce an adaptation. Gatiss even tries to redefine what it is to be a vampire. I can only say this is one of the most ludicrous versions, one that goes way beyond the mere fun of LOVE AT FIRST BITE, far beyond the range of common sense.

Danish actor Claes Bang would probably have been a good Count Dracula if he had not been directed so to be a major irritant in the very role. Whether you are a fan of Bela Lugosi, of Christopher Lee or even of Gary Oldman in the part, Dracula is a role that should not be played for the sake of being an irritant. You want to see this because there is some allure to this Count, who once was a warrior and now is a vampire. Lord of all Vampires. All Bang does is a bang-up job, pun definitely intended, of being a major pain in the ass.  Dolly Wells may be an interesting version of van Helsing but it fails to work for me simply because there is no reason for her presence in this monastery other than arbitrary coincidence. 

Bringing the count into our modern world has been done more succesfully in the Marvel Comics series TOMB OF DRACULA but alas, that is also some time ago. Of this current BBC production I can only say, this bizarre concoction of morbid jokes strung together to a coherent storyline is better quickly forgotten than remembered. It is ironic that this would also be a BBC production while in 1977 it was the BBC that did a most succesful and accurate television adaptation of the novel with Louis Jourdan as an excellent Dracula. I simply could not say that this new version is a well written adaptation. I would rather like to think that if Bramn Stoker could have seen it, he would have turned away in disgust. Better to remember the good ones than to dwell too long on this crappy rubbish.