Interview with the Vampire (2022) s02e06 Episode Script
Like the Light by Which God Made the World Before He Made Light
1
LOUIS: Pieces of my life gone.
I knew who I was without those pieces.
No vampire must commit to writing
the history of the vampires.
Santiago wants to be coven leader.
ARMAND: Others will follow him.
You should think to leave.
I'm staying in Paris with you.
You sold me a dress.
I liked you.
CLAUDIA: There's something broken in me,
- like I want to go bang.
- Well, go bang.
I let you whine and have your say.
Most in my position
will treat you no better
than you treated your maker.
And the friend you made,
you will not see again.
The name is Raglan James.
You're not the first to
attempt this, Mr. Molloy.
I could give you the
names of four others,
and they're all dead or undead.
Four Fred Steins in the album!
You made me look foolish.
MAN: Louis!
MAN: Is that our original interview?
DANIEL: Both our memories cut out.
Same precise edit on two brains.
[GENTLE ORCHESTRAL MUSIC]
[MUSIC INTENSIFIES]
[MUSIC FADES]
["NOCTURNE NO 2" BY CHOPIN]
How did I get the tapes?
There was no postage on
the package with the tapes.
Rashid.
The bylaws of my co-op
say only the mailman
can have the key that opens
up all the mailboxes.
So, did you guys get to my mailman?
Huh? I usually give him a little
something for Christmas,
but I mean you know,
I mean, if he's in on it,
then I'm thinking do I
still have that obligation?
Rashid?
I'm going to the bathroom.
I'm gonna make a run for it
Rashid.
They're gonna turn you into broth bags
'cos you couldn't hold it.
- [CHEF TAKA] Irasshaimase.
- [RAGLAN] Ojamashimasu.
[COUGHS POLITELY] Hello.
They sent a chaperone.
I'm sorry. Go away.
Rashid? He loves the hand
soap they use here.
I wouldn't worry too much about Rashid.
[SIGHS] I've been dreaming
about the mackerel here.
[ARMAND] The two Barcelo's would fit.
[LOUIS] If we replaced the couch.
- I assumed we would.
- The couch, then the table,
then the Antieau Javelina,
then, then, then, then.
How about the Ai Weiwei wallpaper
with the Hockney lemons?
Like we're a Firmdale hotel lobby?
Okay, what do you think
we should do with the wall?
[MOLLOY] How big is the Talamasca?
- Mmm!
- Who funds you guys?
Do you work with nation states?
That's why you called me here?
You had pictures of me in 1973.
Pictures of them.
You were a fly on the windshield.
Can you protect me?
Ah!
From being killed? No.
We're particularly poor at
keeping our assets alive.
I'm not an asset.
You messaged me, I showed up.
The mackerel was better last time.
I want to get out alive.
You want a book.
I want both.
You fear Armand.
You should fear the other one.
What about a selection of Fred
Stein's, tastefully framed?
They've been sitting in
my albums all this time,
seems a waste.
Or better not to have
so tangible a reminder
of Paris up on our walls?
An interview about Paris is
a more tangible reminder
of Paris than a few photographs.
Huh.
Leave it bare then.
Wait for revelation to enter the room.
[RAGLAN] We can help
you find a publisher.
- [MOLLOY] I have a publisher.
- Your publisher will
get a phone call before you turn it in.
They will pay you handsomely
for your manuscript and bury it.
You won't even see a galley proof.
It's all going to come out soon enough
and there's a number of us in the order
who think better it happens
with Daniel Molloy in paperback
than the bumbling
governments of the world.
- What's the ask?
- My superiors have a list,
a few hundred questions
they'd like you to weave
into your interview and I'm
professionally charged to
press you to include them.
And apart from your charge?
I think it would be disastrous.
I think you've been masterful.
I think if I could swap bodies with you,
I'd be running the order by now.
How's the soap, Agent Rashid?
We should be returning now.
Mr. Molloy would like
to stay alive, Rashid.
Then perhaps he should've
thrown the tapes away
when he found them in his mailbox.
Oh, that's very kind of you. Thank you.
I'm leaving you.
I wish to tell you that now.
[SANTIAGO] I thought as much.
And I thought as well that you'd
make a flowery announcement.
[GENTLE PIANO]
Tell me what a monster I
am, what a vulgar fiend.
I make no judgement of you.
I am not interested in you.
I am interested in my own
vampire nature now.
What do you think a vampire is?
[SAM] I don't pretend to know.
What is it?
[ARMAND] A flaccid full-length play
based on nothing other than
the superficial observations
of the vampire Sam, his meditation
on vampiric existence and enduring.
Strange, I remember you
racing back from rehearsals
to tell me how ambitious
the conceit was.
Well, I was following
your advice, wasn't I?
I didn't want to bring the work's
anxieties into our home.
Or you're recalling the events with bias
because of the machinations
surrounding it.
Lead with a velvet glove
instead of an iron gauntlet
was the advice.
Indulge the buffoon were my words.
Feed Santiago his own ego back to him
and smother mutiny with praise.
What does it mean to die
when you can live until
the end of the world?
And what is the end of the
world except a phrase?
I have lived now in two centuries,
seen the illusions of one utterly
shattered by the other,
been eternally young
and eternally ancient,
living moment to moment
in a way that made me picture
a silver clock ticking in a void.
- Line?
- As a painted face.
- Oh! A painted face, yes.
- Let's stop there.
Take the passage again, Santiago.
And a foot forward downstage.
It's quite lovely, Sam.
Even more, what you're
doing with it, Santiago.
Thank you, Maitre.
[GENTLE PIANO]
What does it mean to die
when you can live until
the end of the world?
[ARMAND] I thought I was being clever,
nailing him to the stage.
And what is the end of the
world except a phrase?
[ARMAND] My eyes on him
till curfew every night.
I have lived now in two centuries
But the play had no roles for women
and petulant members of the coven
were free to roam the night.
[PIERRE ROGET] I walked by
the theater a fortnight ago.
- I saw it was that it was dark.
- Yes.
The theater is updating its repertoire.
[PIERRE] Isn't that exciting?
For those with roles in
the updated repertoire
obstreperously exciting.
It's why we sit across from you
this evening, Pierre Roget.
Monsieur Lioncourt,
the gentlemen whose wealth has
made our sacred art possible
for the last 150 years.
Maitre wishes to invite him
to attend the premiere.
Ah, a lovely mission.
Of course, the difficulty is,
uh communications
with your esteemed patron
occur only one way.
[SANTIAGO TELEPATHICALLY]
Ask him when was the last time
they were in communication.
May we ask, when the last
time you spoke with him?
Ah, hard to say.
Communications are irregular.
[SANTIAGO] Has there been
a lapse in communication?
There hasn't been a lapse in
communication, has there?
On that point, I haven't been
authorized to divulge.
[SANTIAGO] Get on with it!
The day, the hour, the minute
you last spoke with
[CELESTE AND SANTIAGO]
Lestat de Lioncourt.
Telegram.
New Orleans, Louisiana,
early February, 1940.
[SANTIAGO] Merci, Monsieur Roget.
illuminated by light.
In retrospect, the buffoon
was in the audience.
Like the light by which God
made the world before He made light.
[ARMAND] Scribbling in the margins
oblivious to the conspiracy
uniting around him.
Ticking, ticking, ticking.
The precision of a clock, in a
room as vast as the universe.
[ARMAND INHALES]
- Bravo!
- Bravo!
Bravo!
Bravo!
- Really?
- Yes.
You were an ancient vampire,
you could read any mind you want.
I was in love.
You buy that?
I buy he'd been in power a long time.
- You can get lazy.
- It was love.
Okay.
And love.
He was loving in those days, sure.
Love.
Rashid. Did you and Mr. Molloy
talk to anyone during dinner?
[RASHID] Just the chef
when ordering, sir.
Were you with Mr. Molloy
the entire dinner?
He used the restroom for
approximately five minutes.
Had a piece of halibut
that still wanted to swim.
You were not to leave Mr. Molloy alone.
He didn't. Stood by the
hand dryer like a creep.
Why do you ask?
Love?
[DRINK POURING]
Mmm.
"Diaries are friends of last resort.
I have found one not
made of paper and glue.
Fuck these vampires."
That's her last entry.
Unless you're sitting on more
of those ripped out pages.
You have everything we have.
Unless you're sitting on something
behind your encrypted laptop.
Madeleine, Claudia's immortal beloved.
Not yet immortal.
Note to self, everything
related to Claudia
from this point forward is
without written corroboration.
Just our memories of her.
However porous they come.
Little more vermouth next time, Rashid.
- I can make another.
- No, it's good.
Just his were better.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[PEOPLE SINGING RAUCOUSLY]
[DRUNKEN SINGING IN FRENCH]
[SINGING CONTINUES]
[GLASS SHATTERS]
[MADELEINE SCREAMS]
[MADELEINE SCREAMS] Lâches-moi !
[BOTH WOMEN SPEAKING FRENCH]
[MADELEINE YELLING]
[MADELEINE SCREAMING]
[CRASHING AND BANGING]
[MADELEINE YELLING AND SCREAMING]
[MADELEINE YELLING AND STRUGGLING]
Uhh!
[MAN SCREAMS]
[DISTANT SCREAMS]
[MADELEINE PANTING]
[METALLIC RATTLING]
[RATTLING AND BANGING]
[MADELEINE PANTING]
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[SOFT WHIMPER]
[LIQUID DRIPPING, SNARLING]
[SOFT WHIMPER]
[MADELEINE PANTING WITH FEAR]
[WOMAN SPLUTTERING]
[SOFT WHIMPER]
[SPLUTTERING]
[MAN SPEAKS FRENCH SOFTLY]
[MADELEINE GASPING]
[MAN GROANING]
[MAN WHIMPERING]
[MADELEINE GASPING]
[MADELEINE MUTTERS SOFTLY IN FRENCH]
[MAN GROANING]
You gonna run?
[MAN GROANING]
Don't.
Don't run, 'cos
a lot of noise just happened,
middle of Paris.
I gotta clean up. I can do it fast.
I can do it right, but
if I don't clean up,
you could be in some trouble.
[MAN GROANING]
That's good.
Sit down.
[MADELEINE BREATHES HEAVILY]
I'm gonna clean up.
- [MADELEINE GASPS]
- And then we can talk.
Vampire.
[GASPS SOFTLY]
[MAN SPLUTTERING]
Where is the light switch?
[INDISTINCT CHATTER IN FRENCH]
Eh? You seen Armand?
- In his office.
- Thank you.
[DISTANT MUSIC PLAYS]
Hey.
Top of the morning.
[FOOTSTEPS]
I got that Wols.
Different brushes, hands,
stains, rubbing, scratching.
Gestures of anxiety, but then the blues.
Like little cigar ends.
Like portals to the sky beyond.
Like he got sick on the canvas?
Watch. I'll sell it for five
times the price in a year.
Thirty times if he keeps
drinking and dies.
- And what then?
- Re-invest.
- More Wols?
- [CHUCKLES]
More Wols. More Mathieu, Soulages.
Real estate. Dividend stocks
with compound interest.
- Maybe a plane.
- [ARMAND LAUGHS]
And who is going to fly your plane?
- I'll fly it.
- The first vampire capitalist.
- The first vampire pilot.
- Why not?
Take your clothes off.
I am going through Sam's new pages.
Clothes off, face down in the coffin.
You can read 'em to me while I fuck you.
Uh! Uhh!
[WOMAN SINGING]
Happiness for everyone ♪
So let's go sunning ♪
[MADELEINE SMIRKS]
It probably reads shallow now,
but not not insightful.
Human death in all its variety.
What's blood taste like?
You've bit your lip before.
No, um
What's it like to drink blood?
Is it like drinking life itself?
Warm.
Thick. It's
It's not answers to life's
mystery. It's food.
I need it.
And me? Right now?
I can't lie. I watch it
slide along your veins.
Take a sip!
- No.
- [IN FRENCH] Pourquoi non ?
- No.
- Pourquoi
'Cos once she starts,
you can't stop her.
This the dressmaker you were
supposed to run out of town?
Um, yes. I'm the forbidden friend.
Madeleine this is Louis. Louis
She's reading one of your
diaries in my coffin.
- I won't tattle.
- She says another word,
I break her arms and
throw her out the window.
Pull up a chair. Let's start again.
I'd like a couple of months
- Louis.
- when you don't tear things down
- This is Madeleine.
- or fuck things up.
- I had you covered.
- She sold me that lavender dress
I wore out a while back.
She's She's funny, she's blunt
and it's a long story,
but I killed in front of her.
[SCOFFS] Of course you did.
And she sat in the corner and watched
while I bundled up bodies.
Didn't cry, didn't get flustered
and since then we've been talking.
Is it romantic?
- No.
- No.
Not yet.
You were Lestat's, now you're Armand's.
Or Armand is mine.
I've been a third all my life.
Not saying that to fight,
just saying that it's true.
I feel like I get to pick
one thing for myself,
and it's her.
A weird white lady I
met by happenstance.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[CHAIR LEGS SCRAPING ON FLOOR]
[GENTLE MUSIC]
You want a companion?
Uh-uh.
She does.
Yes?
Last time I tried, those
young boys back in
They all died, Louis.
I'm too small.
I never made one before.
I'm not sure if I can
No. Not you.
Not Not Lestat's blood.
I wouldn't want that for anyone.
- It was good enough for us.
- Not good enough for her.
She swore an oath, trampled on the laws
and I am to reward her for it?
To every vampire a dressmaker?
They'll bitch at the moon,
mock you in their coffins,
but she'll never fit in.
They won't miss her.
You think you're happy with me now?
Can you imagine me
without the burden of her?
Paris is yours, Maitre.
I ask for this respectfully.
Respect comes without a shield.
You're a manipulator,
Claudia de Lioncourt!
No.
Close your minds, both of you.
I'll know it if you haven't.
[CURTAINS WHOOSH]
They always think they're different.
Stronger, superior.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[ARMAND AND MADELEINE SPEAKING
INDISTINCTLY NEXT DOOR]
[CLAUDIA CHUCKLES]
Without the burden of me?
I said it to get him through the door.
Hmm.
- Did you mean it?
- Does it matter?
I got the result.
Getting results, Louie du Lac.
Is that what you found when
you went looking for yourself?
Shortcut to the end of things?
That's your nerves talking now.
There's been a war.
Claudia, he thinks there is
something left of my era!
[MADELEINE LAUGHS]
He's going to say yes.
[ARMAND TALKING INDISTINCTLY]
You're stronger. I can feel it.
I am.
Harder too.
But you gotta give up
something to get something.
[MADELEINE TALKING INDISTINCTLY]
He's going to say yes.
[MADELEINE LAUGHS]
And I have again.
Hmm.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
- He said no.
- I said I would not do it.
Maitre in the bedroom.
Maitre only when it's hot or convenient.
- That's how I took it.
- I had reasoning.
What was it?
He had never made one.
- What?
- I have never made a vampire.
You are a 500-year-old vampire.
You led the Parisian coven
for two centuries.
- And he hadn't told me.
- I did once. He didn't hear it.
He didn't, no.
The idea repulsed me, repulses me.
Well, at least we can agree
it was a disingenuous act.
- I went there open-minded.
- You walked into Madeleine's
- It was an outrageous request.
- with your mind made up!
Louis's opinion.
Claudia's opinion.
Uh, let's see, let's see, um
"Fuck these vampires."
[SANTIAGO] What I learned
I learned from draining men,
reading their thoughts.
Not from books. I never went to
school long enough as a mortal.
[QUANG PHAM] You do not
know your vampire nature.
When our maker Guido gets
here, he'll tell you the same!
[SANTIAGO] And what
if Guido never shows?
Santiago, why is your
back to the audience?
I've got an impulse.
It doesn't work, turn around.
But if we stage it in the round
And where shall we put the audience?
Behind the fucking projection screen?
Ooh! What's up your arse tonight?
Is your [COUGHS]
companion stuck up there,
chewing on your inner
bits like a hamster?
Claudia, can you respectfully
find another object to buff?
Always a yes, Maitre.
Projections are our aesthetic.
- Or a crutch.
- I am the director, directing.
A play is a map for production.
Uh, no. Uh, a play is the script.
And there are no mentions
in this script of projections.
That's your cue, Sam.
Uh
It's a work in progress.
Oh! Oh, I see.
[ARMAND] Pick it up, where we left off.
Well, if it is a work in progress,
can I ask when the fuck is Guido
arriving on the stage, please?
[SAM] He doesn't, he can't.
- He mustn't.
- Where we left off, Santiago.
Guido is hope. There can be no hope.
You want to write poetry,
write poems. This is a stage.
We perform plays on a stage.
Is this you honoring the playwright?
Not prose, poems or fucking maps!
And plays require events, Sam!
And there are no events in
your shitty little play!
And Quang and I are
bloody dangling up here!
That can be remedied!
Gustave!
We do horror shows so we can eat people!
You're fangless!
[SANTIAGO TELEPATHICALLY]
I love your work, Sam.
Apologies.
[SAM] Well played, Maitre.
- You summoned me?
- There's a script on stage.
It's yours for the moment.
In the round? Humans on stage?
Ignore him. He'll be back.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[LOUIS] The Berlin
Blockade ended in May.
The Geneva Convention
was agreed in August.
Some of the front pages from that year.
But if you look in the filler,
in the back pages.
Strange crimes reported.
[MOTORBIKE ENGINES PURR]
[ARMAND] A telescopic lens stolen
from the Observatory at Meudon.
A film company shooting the
crime thriller 'Porte D'Orient'
delayed when its inventory
of color film stock is snatched.
[LOUIS] A gang of drunkards,
hanging off of the side
of the Eiffel Tower,
all facing south by southwest,
all muttering in unison
gone by the time
police arrive by elevator.
[ARMAND] Crimes all left unsolved.
[LOUIS] A thousand
humans arrive in Paris
each carrying a suitcase.
What's one more vampire?
Why are we still talking about this?
This should be behind us.
I'm not satisfied with your answer.
Those we make ourselves will
always despise us for it.
Celeste and Estelle,
they're inseparable.
Merde'em, Basilic, Planche.
That's a tight band.
And he made you and Claudia.
- You're going to do it?
- Yes.
- When?
- Tonight.
It's forbidden.
Claudia does not want his blood.
She doesn't have an alternative.
It could fail.
The woman could turn into one
of those drooling revenants
you saw back in
[LOUIS] Mmm.
[INDISTINCT CHATTER
AND LAUGHTER OF CROWD]
You shouldn't do it.
You shouldn't tell me.
My mind, I
I I can't keep it closed anymore.
I want you to come.
I want you to witness.
Why?
'Cos it could be beautiful.
We can bring one in a good way.
Are you asking or making me?
Okay.
- I'm sorry.
- It's okay.
It's okay.
Make sure we're not bothered.
Yeah?
[INDISTINCT CHATTER
AND LAUGHTER CONTINUES]
- [JOSEPHINE BAKER SINGING]
- Oh, I like this song!
"My Heart Is An Island Bird".
I've never been to an island.
Well, once.
On a lake, surrounded by carp.
I don't like carp,
I don't like Chardonnay.
This feels right for my life.
Gonna go crazy if we don't start.
Yeah, me too. [COUGHS]
Now then, if you get scared,
you just look at that light
and listen to my voice.
I won't let anything go wrong.
Don't worry about the blood.
It's the blood that made you.
[SNARLING]
[SOFT SNARLS]
[THE SONG CONTINUES]
[MADELEINE GASPS]
Madeleine welcomed my fangs.
The lamb smiling up at the wolf
with unsettling passivity.
- [SQUELCHING]
- [MADELEINE GASPS]
[LOUIS] She watched the
lamp while I fed on her.
That's good. That's right.
You're turning cold. That's good too.
[LOUIS] And Claudia guided her softly
down the path, down the dark path.
Just hold on to my voice.
[MADELEINE BREATHING HEAVILY]
[SOFTLY] I want you to.
[SOFTLY] I want you to.
[THE SONG REACHES A CRESCENDO AND ENDS]
[MADELEINE GASPS]
[HER GASPS CONTINUE]
[RECORD NEEDLE CRACKLES]
Claudia drank with reverence.
I drank with
obligation.
Disjointed fragments of Madeleine's life
filled my head,
carried on the warm
current of her blood.
The pleasures of a sly coupling.
The joys of a sunny afternoon.
The anguish of an unexpected death.
[FLASH BULB POPS]
The rage and humiliation
of a trial by mob.
[CROWD SHOUTING, DRUM BEATING]
But amongst the pastiche
of war and desire,
beauty and damage
I saw Claudia
in an impossible afternoon light
she could never survive in.
Claudia as Madeleine perceived her.
Resplendent.
Rendered even more
beautiful by her beholder.
And I knew then, with all certainty,
she would be a better
companion to Claudia
than I ever had.
I tore my wrist
and fed her the gift.
[BLOOD SPLASHES]
[DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES]
[FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING]
Did she take?
Yeah.
Yeah, she is.
They're both on their way.
I told 'em to get out of town.
They're out of town.
And I know that
because I can feel her.
Madeleine.
This stranger.
My fledgling.
What happened here?
Opened my wrist back up.
Gagged myself, tried to
throw the blood back up.
I thought I'd feel like
I was losing Claudia.
I did not care.
I finished the job.
Claudia took my hand.
We said something about being even.
I did not care.
You were right.
Give it time.
She is a difficult one,
but one worth having.
Hmm.
You'll find your way back to each other.
What's in the suitcase?
Some clothes.
A few books.
A cutting from a magnolia
tree I've been growing.
I could have fought.
They might've killed me.
Hunted the three of you down,
caught you, burned you.
I don't know if it will satisfy.
There might be hostilities
or the first bloodless vampire coup.
You broke with the coven?
They gave me a choice.
I chose.
[LOUIS] That's what
you said to me, right?
Standing in my blood, stroking my hair.
You know it is.
That's my memory of it.
But you were there too.
Maybe there's something I missed?
Or maybe there's something
- you put in there later.
- Stop it!
Stop it.
This is too important a moment
in our story for these games.
Oh, is there a game being played?
You've remembered what you did
to yourself in San Francisco.
And you're angry that I erased it.
I am.
You've no right to be.
You asked me to do it.
- What?
- He's full of shit.
I've failed Louis once in my life.
- It wasn't in San Francisco.
- I'd never ask you to do that!
The pages I tore out
of Claudia's diaries,
- we did most of those together.
- Not all of them.
And the ones I did on my
own were to protect me
from you, Mr. Molloy.
Why did I owe you my shame?
Why did I owe you my
one act of cowardice?
The series of abhorrent
consequences that followed?
I've spent the rest of my life
trying to make up for it.
I'll never make up for it.
But he forgave me for it.
I didn't forgive you.
Drugs did far more damage to your mind
than five nights in San Francisco.
- It was six.
- My point made.
You've as sharp a mind
as any human that walks.
You want an apology. I'm sorry.
He thought it was the
right thing to do too.
You were going to drain me, pal.
Belated apology number two.
I asked you to erase it?
Yes.
[GENTLE PIANO]
After you came out of a shower
in our home in Sausalito.
Three days after we abandoned him.
[GENTLE PIANO]
[SIGHS AND SHUDDERS]
Continuing on the record,
Mr. Molloy, I was a coward.
[GENTLE PIANO]
[CLAUDIA] We've been burying
our meals outside Saint Denis.
Flowers are starting pop
up out of the ground.
Lavender, sweet iris, peony.
Flowers growing from the dead.
Cold things becoming warm.
I saw a dead girl in your mind,
while you were dying.
Oui. Aimee, my sister.
She the replacement?
What?
I saw the same thing that night.
We already had it out.
Aimee, we used to call
her the family idiot.
She would eat pinecones.
And I didn't tell her about Aimee
because I didn't want
her thinking she was
- What was your word?
- A replacement.
So thank you for falling right
back into Daddy Lou shoes.
And thank you for never
treating me like a child.
Take some lessons, Louis.
[ARMAND] Are you thinking
of coming back to Paris?
Trash piles and men who smell
like cheese? Non, merci. No.
- We're going to wander.
- [LOUIS] Wander?
- Mm-hm.
- [LOUIS CHUCKLES]
Wander?
- This one?
- Mm-hm.
She of the straight line to
the next X on the map?
This is the X, Louis.
Alright. Okay, well to finding the X.
- [MADELEINE] Santé !
- Santé !
How do you like my coffin?
I wake up at night and the
Phams aren't trading insults,
Estelle isn't smearing
makeup all over herself
- or humming off-key.
- [CLAUDIA] Singing off-key.
No one is forcing me to
listen to their gossips
or solve their petty crises.
It's bliss.
Still, we didn't make it easy for you.
I'm sorry for that.
You alright there?
I cannot read your mind.
The architects of our, uh [COUGHS]
I made you, that's just the way it is.
Yes, but I feel you, Louis.
I feel you too, Madeleine.
I told Claudia I can
feel you love her
and we should see him once more.
I'm glad you did.
I'm glad we did this.
I can feel you too.
Through him.
- Yes, he loves you.
- Okay.
Okay, well, let's get the
hell out of my soul!
[LAUGHTER]
He gets enough affection.
I don't need his head getting
too big to get out the door.
Taking a stretch.
Order me another, love.
There he goes.
- Mm-hm, there he goes!
- [LAUGHTER]
Will he get through the
door with that big head?
[LAUGHTER]
[MADELEINE LAUGHS]
Why don't you want him to know
how much you love him?
[LOUIS] That's a little personal.
- He knows.
- [MADELEINE] Uh-huh.
[LOUIS] He knows.
[TENSE MUSIC]
[DAUNTING MUSIC]
They gave him a choice.
He chose.
[SANTIAGO] Ladies and gentlemen!
Mesdames et messieurs !
Offal and offalesses!
And all those who flourish
outside the divide, welcome.
For 150 years, we here at
the Theatre Des Vampires
- have shown you "you".
- [AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
Your obscene predilections,
your savage desires.
But today, we're shunting
human affairs aside.
So if you want to kill your
lover or fuck your mother,
it'll have to wait.
[AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
Because today
we're turning our lurid
spotlight on ourselves!
I stand before you in broad daylight
at this first ever matinee
at the Theatre Des Vampires
to perform for your
salacious gratification
[AUDIENCE] Yes!
us!
Are you ready, you filthy animals?
- [AUDIENCE SHOUTING] Yes!
- Yes?
- [CHEERING AND APPLAUSE]
- Yes?
[WHISTLING AND CHEERING]
The jury may be seated!
[CHEERING AND APPLAUSE]
[DRAMATIC CLASSICAL MUSIC]
- [SANTIAGO] Whoa!
- [CELESTE] Advocat!
Read the crimes for which this
iniquitous trio stand accused.
[SANTIAGO SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY ON STAGE]
the making of a vampire
from a mortal child.
Ten minutes to your entrance,
Monsieur Lioncourt.
[SANTIAGO] of the vampires to
the mortal, Madeleine Eparvier.
[ROMAINE] Monsieur Lioncourt?
- [SANTIAGO] Finally, the most
- [LESTAT] Thank you.
[SANTIAGO] the heretical
desecration of Law Five
[LESTAT] Ten minutes.
[SANTIAGO] The pre-meditated murders
of the vampiress Antoinette Brown
and the vampire Lestat de Lioncourt.
[MUSIC STOPS ABRUPTLY]
LOUIS: We were on trial for murder
and all I could think was
♪
he's coming.
SANTIAGO: Lestat de
Lioncourt, the victim.
It's justice for the attempted
murder of my being.
guilty
♪
Aah!
or not guilty?
- Mmm.
- Who funds you guys?
Do you work with nation states?
I think the stakes for
Molloy in Episode 6
really begin to ramp up.
I mean, it doesn't help that
the Talamasca is telling him
that things are getting intense.
Can you protect me?
Oh!
From being killed?
No. We're particularly poor
at keeping our assets alive.
But also, he's really making headway.
And he's an experienced
enough journalist to know
that with powerful people,
they're liable to lash out.
So I think, yeah, there's real fear.
And you can see it in Eric's performance
that he's still cracking wise,
but it may not be quite as convincing.
I wanna get out alive.
You fear Armand.
You should fear the other one.
Imagine a tightrope walker.
He knows that he knows
how to walk a tightrope.
But every once in a while,
he glances down,
and a little shiver goes
through his stomach,
that cold chill.
Rashid.
Did you and Mr. Molloy talk
to anyone during dinner?
As soon as he gets an inkling
that they know, he's already working on
how to manipulate it and spin a new web.
Why do you ask love?
Louis' known for a long time
that there's something wrong.
There's a lie being told,
and that penthouse in
Dubai is a bit of a prison,
and I think Louis and Daniel
throughout the years
have been like sort of
kept things for Armand.
♪
[CHOKING]
MARK: Claudia revealing
that she's a vampire
shows how comfortable she is
revealing that to another person.
Don't run.
DELAINEY: I think it's really beautiful
that she gives Madeleine the choice
on how to react to her being a vampire.
I'm gonna clean up.
They have such amazing chemistry.
I was just drawn to
what they were doing.
Is it romantic?
- No.
- No.
- Not yet.
- She likes her so much
and sees that there's something in her
that she's actually like,
"Here's me in all my entirety.
What are you going to do now?
You have a choice to make."
I feel like I get to pick
one thing for myself.
And it's her.
Louis turns Madeleine without doubt
because he loves Claudia.
And that's what he wants to do for her.
LOUIS: You think you're
happy with me now?
Can you imagine me
without the burden of her?
Claudia's very good at reading people.
She knows that she can convince Louis.
You're going to do it?
Yes.
- When?
- Tonight.
The reason that Louis does it is
because they're reaching that stage
where they're growing apart now,
and it's like, oh, okay, so once
we do this, we're done.
JACOB: Turning Madeleine was
a really beautiful moment
for Madeleine and Claudia,
and I was just thinking, like,
I just don't want to get in the way.
I'm gonna go crazy if we don't start.
- Yeah, me, too.
- And I couldn't anyway.
What they're doing is so magnetic.
If you get scared, you
just look at that light.
Working with Kat, who was
our intimacy coordinator,
we worked on, like, levels of distance
between like mouth to neck.
[BOTH GASPING]
When we see Louis take
a bite of Madeleine,
it's like Claudia's hunger
takes over, as well,
and she gets involved.
JACOB: I love that scene.
I love that relationship.
Those two characters deserve more
than any of the characters in the show
to just be able to live,
like, an eternal life,
companionship together.
[GASPS]
♪
MADELEINE: Flowers
growing from the dead.
Cold things becoming warm.
The scene in the cafe where
they, like, meet up
To finding the X.
seems like a romantic comedy
or like a family Thanksgiving.
Everyone's getting back
together, and it's awkward,
and you feel the tensions.
You alright there?
The sets were beautiful.
They built a cafe, with a
band and beautiful lights.
For the Mishka Bar,
named after my eldest dog,
we wanted this almost to
feel like a fever dream,
but really playing with light and space
in a way that connects kind of deeply
with what's happening with the scene.
And we got to do a bit of improvising
in that scene, as well.
I got to shout things at Armand.
Will he get through the
door with that big head?
- [LAUGHTER]
- DELAINEY: Filming it was so bittersweet,
because we were having
such a lovely dinner,
and then it all goes
♪
Gustav was the vampire
that kidnaps Claudia.
And you can hear Louis
screaming for Claudia.
Louis' just, like, missile
focused on Claudia.
He's like, how do I get
her out of this situation?
I have to give massive props
to the background actors on our show
who would just like, be
completely still in place
and just do it again and again
and again and again and again.
[CHEERS AND APPLAUSE]
I think pissed doesn't really
cover how Louis feels
- when they're kidnapped.
- The jury may be seated.
MAN: 10 minutes to your
entrance, Monsieur Lioncourt.
Lestat returns for the trial.
Thank you.
He's back in all his kind of
hectic, complicated glory.
What is he going to do?
EMCEE: And the vampire
Lestat de Lioncourt.
♪
LOUIS: Pieces of my life gone.
I knew who I was without those pieces.
No vampire must commit to writing
the history of the vampires.
Santiago wants to be coven leader.
ARMAND: Others will follow him.
You should think to leave.
I'm staying in Paris with you.
You sold me a dress.
I liked you.
CLAUDIA: There's something broken in me,
- like I want to go bang.
- Well, go bang.
I let you whine and have your say.
Most in my position
will treat you no better
than you treated your maker.
And the friend you made,
you will not see again.
The name is Raglan James.
You're not the first to
attempt this, Mr. Molloy.
I could give you the
names of four others,
and they're all dead or undead.
Four Fred Steins in the album!
You made me look foolish.
MAN: Louis!
MAN: Is that our original interview?
DANIEL: Both our memories cut out.
Same precise edit on two brains.
[GENTLE ORCHESTRAL MUSIC]
[MUSIC INTENSIFIES]
[MUSIC FADES]
["NOCTURNE NO 2" BY CHOPIN]
How did I get the tapes?
There was no postage on
the package with the tapes.
Rashid.
The bylaws of my co-op
say only the mailman
can have the key that opens
up all the mailboxes.
So, did you guys get to my mailman?
Huh? I usually give him a little
something for Christmas,
but I mean you know,
I mean, if he's in on it,
then I'm thinking do I
still have that obligation?
Rashid?
I'm going to the bathroom.
I'm gonna make a run for it
Rashid.
They're gonna turn you into broth bags
'cos you couldn't hold it.
- [CHEF TAKA] Irasshaimase.
- [RAGLAN] Ojamashimasu.
[COUGHS POLITELY] Hello.
They sent a chaperone.
I'm sorry. Go away.
Rashid? He loves the hand
soap they use here.
I wouldn't worry too much about Rashid.
[SIGHS] I've been dreaming
about the mackerel here.
[ARMAND] The two Barcelo's would fit.
[LOUIS] If we replaced the couch.
- I assumed we would.
- The couch, then the table,
then the Antieau Javelina,
then, then, then, then.
How about the Ai Weiwei wallpaper
with the Hockney lemons?
Like we're a Firmdale hotel lobby?
Okay, what do you think
we should do with the wall?
[MOLLOY] How big is the Talamasca?
- Mmm!
- Who funds you guys?
Do you work with nation states?
That's why you called me here?
You had pictures of me in 1973.
Pictures of them.
You were a fly on the windshield.
Can you protect me?
Ah!
From being killed? No.
We're particularly poor at
keeping our assets alive.
I'm not an asset.
You messaged me, I showed up.
The mackerel was better last time.
I want to get out alive.
You want a book.
I want both.
You fear Armand.
You should fear the other one.
What about a selection of Fred
Stein's, tastefully framed?
They've been sitting in
my albums all this time,
seems a waste.
Or better not to have
so tangible a reminder
of Paris up on our walls?
An interview about Paris is
a more tangible reminder
of Paris than a few photographs.
Huh.
Leave it bare then.
Wait for revelation to enter the room.
[RAGLAN] We can help
you find a publisher.
- [MOLLOY] I have a publisher.
- Your publisher will
get a phone call before you turn it in.
They will pay you handsomely
for your manuscript and bury it.
You won't even see a galley proof.
It's all going to come out soon enough
and there's a number of us in the order
who think better it happens
with Daniel Molloy in paperback
than the bumbling
governments of the world.
- What's the ask?
- My superiors have a list,
a few hundred questions
they'd like you to weave
into your interview and I'm
professionally charged to
press you to include them.
And apart from your charge?
I think it would be disastrous.
I think you've been masterful.
I think if I could swap bodies with you,
I'd be running the order by now.
How's the soap, Agent Rashid?
We should be returning now.
Mr. Molloy would like
to stay alive, Rashid.
Then perhaps he should've
thrown the tapes away
when he found them in his mailbox.
Oh, that's very kind of you. Thank you.
I'm leaving you.
I wish to tell you that now.
[SANTIAGO] I thought as much.
And I thought as well that you'd
make a flowery announcement.
[GENTLE PIANO]
Tell me what a monster I
am, what a vulgar fiend.
I make no judgement of you.
I am not interested in you.
I am interested in my own
vampire nature now.
What do you think a vampire is?
[SAM] I don't pretend to know.
What is it?
[ARMAND] A flaccid full-length play
based on nothing other than
the superficial observations
of the vampire Sam, his meditation
on vampiric existence and enduring.
Strange, I remember you
racing back from rehearsals
to tell me how ambitious
the conceit was.
Well, I was following
your advice, wasn't I?
I didn't want to bring the work's
anxieties into our home.
Or you're recalling the events with bias
because of the machinations
surrounding it.
Lead with a velvet glove
instead of an iron gauntlet
was the advice.
Indulge the buffoon were my words.
Feed Santiago his own ego back to him
and smother mutiny with praise.
What does it mean to die
when you can live until
the end of the world?
And what is the end of the
world except a phrase?
I have lived now in two centuries,
seen the illusions of one utterly
shattered by the other,
been eternally young
and eternally ancient,
living moment to moment
in a way that made me picture
a silver clock ticking in a void.
- Line?
- As a painted face.
- Oh! A painted face, yes.
- Let's stop there.
Take the passage again, Santiago.
And a foot forward downstage.
It's quite lovely, Sam.
Even more, what you're
doing with it, Santiago.
Thank you, Maitre.
[GENTLE PIANO]
What does it mean to die
when you can live until
the end of the world?
[ARMAND] I thought I was being clever,
nailing him to the stage.
And what is the end of the
world except a phrase?
[ARMAND] My eyes on him
till curfew every night.
I have lived now in two centuries
But the play had no roles for women
and petulant members of the coven
were free to roam the night.
[PIERRE ROGET] I walked by
the theater a fortnight ago.
- I saw it was that it was dark.
- Yes.
The theater is updating its repertoire.
[PIERRE] Isn't that exciting?
For those with roles in
the updated repertoire
obstreperously exciting.
It's why we sit across from you
this evening, Pierre Roget.
Monsieur Lioncourt,
the gentlemen whose wealth has
made our sacred art possible
for the last 150 years.
Maitre wishes to invite him
to attend the premiere.
Ah, a lovely mission.
Of course, the difficulty is,
uh communications
with your esteemed patron
occur only one way.
[SANTIAGO TELEPATHICALLY]
Ask him when was the last time
they were in communication.
May we ask, when the last
time you spoke with him?
Ah, hard to say.
Communications are irregular.
[SANTIAGO] Has there been
a lapse in communication?
There hasn't been a lapse in
communication, has there?
On that point, I haven't been
authorized to divulge.
[SANTIAGO] Get on with it!
The day, the hour, the minute
you last spoke with
[CELESTE AND SANTIAGO]
Lestat de Lioncourt.
Telegram.
New Orleans, Louisiana,
early February, 1940.
[SANTIAGO] Merci, Monsieur Roget.
illuminated by light.
In retrospect, the buffoon
was in the audience.
Like the light by which God
made the world before He made light.
[ARMAND] Scribbling in the margins
oblivious to the conspiracy
uniting around him.
Ticking, ticking, ticking.
The precision of a clock, in a
room as vast as the universe.
[ARMAND INHALES]
- Bravo!
- Bravo!
Bravo!
Bravo!
- Really?
- Yes.
You were an ancient vampire,
you could read any mind you want.
I was in love.
You buy that?
I buy he'd been in power a long time.
- You can get lazy.
- It was love.
Okay.
And love.
He was loving in those days, sure.
Love.
Rashid. Did you and Mr. Molloy
talk to anyone during dinner?
[RASHID] Just the chef
when ordering, sir.
Were you with Mr. Molloy
the entire dinner?
He used the restroom for
approximately five minutes.
Had a piece of halibut
that still wanted to swim.
You were not to leave Mr. Molloy alone.
He didn't. Stood by the
hand dryer like a creep.
Why do you ask?
Love?
[DRINK POURING]
Mmm.
"Diaries are friends of last resort.
I have found one not
made of paper and glue.
Fuck these vampires."
That's her last entry.
Unless you're sitting on more
of those ripped out pages.
You have everything we have.
Unless you're sitting on something
behind your encrypted laptop.
Madeleine, Claudia's immortal beloved.
Not yet immortal.
Note to self, everything
related to Claudia
from this point forward is
without written corroboration.
Just our memories of her.
However porous they come.
Little more vermouth next time, Rashid.
- I can make another.
- No, it's good.
Just his were better.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[PEOPLE SINGING RAUCOUSLY]
[DRUNKEN SINGING IN FRENCH]
[SINGING CONTINUES]
[GLASS SHATTERS]
[MADELEINE SCREAMS]
[MADELEINE SCREAMS] Lâches-moi !
[BOTH WOMEN SPEAKING FRENCH]
[MADELEINE YELLING]
[MADELEINE SCREAMING]
[CRASHING AND BANGING]
[MADELEINE YELLING AND SCREAMING]
[MADELEINE YELLING AND STRUGGLING]
Uhh!
[MAN SCREAMS]
[DISTANT SCREAMS]
[MADELEINE PANTING]
[METALLIC RATTLING]
[RATTLING AND BANGING]
[MADELEINE PANTING]
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[SOFT WHIMPER]
[LIQUID DRIPPING, SNARLING]
[SOFT WHIMPER]
[MADELEINE PANTING WITH FEAR]
[WOMAN SPLUTTERING]
[SOFT WHIMPER]
[SPLUTTERING]
[MAN SPEAKS FRENCH SOFTLY]
[MADELEINE GASPING]
[MAN GROANING]
[MAN WHIMPERING]
[MADELEINE GASPING]
[MADELEINE MUTTERS SOFTLY IN FRENCH]
[MAN GROANING]
You gonna run?
[MAN GROANING]
Don't.
Don't run, 'cos
a lot of noise just happened,
middle of Paris.
I gotta clean up. I can do it fast.
I can do it right, but
if I don't clean up,
you could be in some trouble.
[MAN GROANING]
That's good.
Sit down.
[MADELEINE BREATHES HEAVILY]
I'm gonna clean up.
- [MADELEINE GASPS]
- And then we can talk.
Vampire.
[GASPS SOFTLY]
[MAN SPLUTTERING]
Where is the light switch?
[INDISTINCT CHATTER IN FRENCH]
Eh? You seen Armand?
- In his office.
- Thank you.
[DISTANT MUSIC PLAYS]
Hey.
Top of the morning.
[FOOTSTEPS]
I got that Wols.
Different brushes, hands,
stains, rubbing, scratching.
Gestures of anxiety, but then the blues.
Like little cigar ends.
Like portals to the sky beyond.
Like he got sick on the canvas?
Watch. I'll sell it for five
times the price in a year.
Thirty times if he keeps
drinking and dies.
- And what then?
- Re-invest.
- More Wols?
- [CHUCKLES]
More Wols. More Mathieu, Soulages.
Real estate. Dividend stocks
with compound interest.
- Maybe a plane.
- [ARMAND LAUGHS]
And who is going to fly your plane?
- I'll fly it.
- The first vampire capitalist.
- The first vampire pilot.
- Why not?
Take your clothes off.
I am going through Sam's new pages.
Clothes off, face down in the coffin.
You can read 'em to me while I fuck you.
Uh! Uhh!
[WOMAN SINGING]
Happiness for everyone ♪
So let's go sunning ♪
[MADELEINE SMIRKS]
It probably reads shallow now,
but not not insightful.
Human death in all its variety.
What's blood taste like?
You've bit your lip before.
No, um
What's it like to drink blood?
Is it like drinking life itself?
Warm.
Thick. It's
It's not answers to life's
mystery. It's food.
I need it.
And me? Right now?
I can't lie. I watch it
slide along your veins.
Take a sip!
- No.
- [IN FRENCH] Pourquoi non ?
- No.
- Pourquoi
'Cos once she starts,
you can't stop her.
This the dressmaker you were
supposed to run out of town?
Um, yes. I'm the forbidden friend.
Madeleine this is Louis. Louis
She's reading one of your
diaries in my coffin.
- I won't tattle.
- She says another word,
I break her arms and
throw her out the window.
Pull up a chair. Let's start again.
I'd like a couple of months
- Louis.
- when you don't tear things down
- This is Madeleine.
- or fuck things up.
- I had you covered.
- She sold me that lavender dress
I wore out a while back.
She's She's funny, she's blunt
and it's a long story,
but I killed in front of her.
[SCOFFS] Of course you did.
And she sat in the corner and watched
while I bundled up bodies.
Didn't cry, didn't get flustered
and since then we've been talking.
Is it romantic?
- No.
- No.
Not yet.
You were Lestat's, now you're Armand's.
Or Armand is mine.
I've been a third all my life.
Not saying that to fight,
just saying that it's true.
I feel like I get to pick
one thing for myself,
and it's her.
A weird white lady I
met by happenstance.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[CHAIR LEGS SCRAPING ON FLOOR]
[GENTLE MUSIC]
You want a companion?
Uh-uh.
She does.
Yes?
Last time I tried, those
young boys back in
They all died, Louis.
I'm too small.
I never made one before.
I'm not sure if I can
No. Not you.
Not Not Lestat's blood.
I wouldn't want that for anyone.
- It was good enough for us.
- Not good enough for her.
She swore an oath, trampled on the laws
and I am to reward her for it?
To every vampire a dressmaker?
They'll bitch at the moon,
mock you in their coffins,
but she'll never fit in.
They won't miss her.
You think you're happy with me now?
Can you imagine me
without the burden of her?
Paris is yours, Maitre.
I ask for this respectfully.
Respect comes without a shield.
You're a manipulator,
Claudia de Lioncourt!
No.
Close your minds, both of you.
I'll know it if you haven't.
[CURTAINS WHOOSH]
They always think they're different.
Stronger, superior.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[ARMAND AND MADELEINE SPEAKING
INDISTINCTLY NEXT DOOR]
[CLAUDIA CHUCKLES]
Without the burden of me?
I said it to get him through the door.
Hmm.
- Did you mean it?
- Does it matter?
I got the result.
Getting results, Louie du Lac.
Is that what you found when
you went looking for yourself?
Shortcut to the end of things?
That's your nerves talking now.
There's been a war.
Claudia, he thinks there is
something left of my era!
[MADELEINE LAUGHS]
He's going to say yes.
[ARMAND TALKING INDISTINCTLY]
You're stronger. I can feel it.
I am.
Harder too.
But you gotta give up
something to get something.
[MADELEINE TALKING INDISTINCTLY]
He's going to say yes.
[MADELEINE LAUGHS]
And I have again.
Hmm.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
- He said no.
- I said I would not do it.
Maitre in the bedroom.
Maitre only when it's hot or convenient.
- That's how I took it.
- I had reasoning.
What was it?
He had never made one.
- What?
- I have never made a vampire.
You are a 500-year-old vampire.
You led the Parisian coven
for two centuries.
- And he hadn't told me.
- I did once. He didn't hear it.
He didn't, no.
The idea repulsed me, repulses me.
Well, at least we can agree
it was a disingenuous act.
- I went there open-minded.
- You walked into Madeleine's
- It was an outrageous request.
- with your mind made up!
Louis's opinion.
Claudia's opinion.
Uh, let's see, let's see, um
"Fuck these vampires."
[SANTIAGO] What I learned
I learned from draining men,
reading their thoughts.
Not from books. I never went to
school long enough as a mortal.
[QUANG PHAM] You do not
know your vampire nature.
When our maker Guido gets
here, he'll tell you the same!
[SANTIAGO] And what
if Guido never shows?
Santiago, why is your
back to the audience?
I've got an impulse.
It doesn't work, turn around.
But if we stage it in the round
And where shall we put the audience?
Behind the fucking projection screen?
Ooh! What's up your arse tonight?
Is your [COUGHS]
companion stuck up there,
chewing on your inner
bits like a hamster?
Claudia, can you respectfully
find another object to buff?
Always a yes, Maitre.
Projections are our aesthetic.
- Or a crutch.
- I am the director, directing.
A play is a map for production.
Uh, no. Uh, a play is the script.
And there are no mentions
in this script of projections.
That's your cue, Sam.
Uh
It's a work in progress.
Oh! Oh, I see.
[ARMAND] Pick it up, where we left off.
Well, if it is a work in progress,
can I ask when the fuck is Guido
arriving on the stage, please?
[SAM] He doesn't, he can't.
- He mustn't.
- Where we left off, Santiago.
Guido is hope. There can be no hope.
You want to write poetry,
write poems. This is a stage.
We perform plays on a stage.
Is this you honoring the playwright?
Not prose, poems or fucking maps!
And plays require events, Sam!
And there are no events in
your shitty little play!
And Quang and I are
bloody dangling up here!
That can be remedied!
Gustave!
We do horror shows so we can eat people!
You're fangless!
[SANTIAGO TELEPATHICALLY]
I love your work, Sam.
Apologies.
[SAM] Well played, Maitre.
- You summoned me?
- There's a script on stage.
It's yours for the moment.
In the round? Humans on stage?
Ignore him. He'll be back.
[GENTLE MUSIC]
[LOUIS] The Berlin
Blockade ended in May.
The Geneva Convention
was agreed in August.
Some of the front pages from that year.
But if you look in the filler,
in the back pages.
Strange crimes reported.
[MOTORBIKE ENGINES PURR]
[ARMAND] A telescopic lens stolen
from the Observatory at Meudon.
A film company shooting the
crime thriller 'Porte D'Orient'
delayed when its inventory
of color film stock is snatched.
[LOUIS] A gang of drunkards,
hanging off of the side
of the Eiffel Tower,
all facing south by southwest,
all muttering in unison
gone by the time
police arrive by elevator.
[ARMAND] Crimes all left unsolved.
[LOUIS] A thousand
humans arrive in Paris
each carrying a suitcase.
What's one more vampire?
Why are we still talking about this?
This should be behind us.
I'm not satisfied with your answer.
Those we make ourselves will
always despise us for it.
Celeste and Estelle,
they're inseparable.
Merde'em, Basilic, Planche.
That's a tight band.
And he made you and Claudia.
- You're going to do it?
- Yes.
- When?
- Tonight.
It's forbidden.
Claudia does not want his blood.
She doesn't have an alternative.
It could fail.
The woman could turn into one
of those drooling revenants
you saw back in
[LOUIS] Mmm.
[INDISTINCT CHATTER
AND LAUGHTER OF CROWD]
You shouldn't do it.
You shouldn't tell me.
My mind, I
I I can't keep it closed anymore.
I want you to come.
I want you to witness.
Why?
'Cos it could be beautiful.
We can bring one in a good way.
Are you asking or making me?
Okay.
- I'm sorry.
- It's okay.
It's okay.
Make sure we're not bothered.
Yeah?
[INDISTINCT CHATTER
AND LAUGHTER CONTINUES]
- [JOSEPHINE BAKER SINGING]
- Oh, I like this song!
"My Heart Is An Island Bird".
I've never been to an island.
Well, once.
On a lake, surrounded by carp.
I don't like carp,
I don't like Chardonnay.
This feels right for my life.
Gonna go crazy if we don't start.
Yeah, me too. [COUGHS]
Now then, if you get scared,
you just look at that light
and listen to my voice.
I won't let anything go wrong.
Don't worry about the blood.
It's the blood that made you.
[SNARLING]
[SOFT SNARLS]
[THE SONG CONTINUES]
[MADELEINE GASPS]
Madeleine welcomed my fangs.
The lamb smiling up at the wolf
with unsettling passivity.
- [SQUELCHING]
- [MADELEINE GASPS]
[LOUIS] She watched the
lamp while I fed on her.
That's good. That's right.
You're turning cold. That's good too.
[LOUIS] And Claudia guided her softly
down the path, down the dark path.
Just hold on to my voice.
[MADELEINE BREATHING HEAVILY]
[SOFTLY] I want you to.
[SOFTLY] I want you to.
[THE SONG REACHES A CRESCENDO AND ENDS]
[MADELEINE GASPS]
[HER GASPS CONTINUE]
[RECORD NEEDLE CRACKLES]
Claudia drank with reverence.
I drank with
obligation.
Disjointed fragments of Madeleine's life
filled my head,
carried on the warm
current of her blood.
The pleasures of a sly coupling.
The joys of a sunny afternoon.
The anguish of an unexpected death.
[FLASH BULB POPS]
The rage and humiliation
of a trial by mob.
[CROWD SHOUTING, DRUM BEATING]
But amongst the pastiche
of war and desire,
beauty and damage
I saw Claudia
in an impossible afternoon light
she could never survive in.
Claudia as Madeleine perceived her.
Resplendent.
Rendered even more
beautiful by her beholder.
And I knew then, with all certainty,
she would be a better
companion to Claudia
than I ever had.
I tore my wrist
and fed her the gift.
[BLOOD SPLASHES]
[DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES]
[FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING]
Did she take?
Yeah.
Yeah, she is.
They're both on their way.
I told 'em to get out of town.
They're out of town.
And I know that
because I can feel her.
Madeleine.
This stranger.
My fledgling.
What happened here?
Opened my wrist back up.
Gagged myself, tried to
throw the blood back up.
I thought I'd feel like
I was losing Claudia.
I did not care.
I finished the job.
Claudia took my hand.
We said something about being even.
I did not care.
You were right.
Give it time.
She is a difficult one,
but one worth having.
Hmm.
You'll find your way back to each other.
What's in the suitcase?
Some clothes.
A few books.
A cutting from a magnolia
tree I've been growing.
I could have fought.
They might've killed me.
Hunted the three of you down,
caught you, burned you.
I don't know if it will satisfy.
There might be hostilities
or the first bloodless vampire coup.
You broke with the coven?
They gave me a choice.
I chose.
[LOUIS] That's what
you said to me, right?
Standing in my blood, stroking my hair.
You know it is.
That's my memory of it.
But you were there too.
Maybe there's something I missed?
Or maybe there's something
- you put in there later.
- Stop it!
Stop it.
This is too important a moment
in our story for these games.
Oh, is there a game being played?
You've remembered what you did
to yourself in San Francisco.
And you're angry that I erased it.
I am.
You've no right to be.
You asked me to do it.
- What?
- He's full of shit.
I've failed Louis once in my life.
- It wasn't in San Francisco.
- I'd never ask you to do that!
The pages I tore out
of Claudia's diaries,
- we did most of those together.
- Not all of them.
And the ones I did on my
own were to protect me
from you, Mr. Molloy.
Why did I owe you my shame?
Why did I owe you my
one act of cowardice?
The series of abhorrent
consequences that followed?
I've spent the rest of my life
trying to make up for it.
I'll never make up for it.
But he forgave me for it.
I didn't forgive you.
Drugs did far more damage to your mind
than five nights in San Francisco.
- It was six.
- My point made.
You've as sharp a mind
as any human that walks.
You want an apology. I'm sorry.
He thought it was the
right thing to do too.
You were going to drain me, pal.
Belated apology number two.
I asked you to erase it?
Yes.
[GENTLE PIANO]
After you came out of a shower
in our home in Sausalito.
Three days after we abandoned him.
[GENTLE PIANO]
[SIGHS AND SHUDDERS]
Continuing on the record,
Mr. Molloy, I was a coward.
[GENTLE PIANO]
[CLAUDIA] We've been burying
our meals outside Saint Denis.
Flowers are starting pop
up out of the ground.
Lavender, sweet iris, peony.
Flowers growing from the dead.
Cold things becoming warm.
I saw a dead girl in your mind,
while you were dying.
Oui. Aimee, my sister.
She the replacement?
What?
I saw the same thing that night.
We already had it out.
Aimee, we used to call
her the family idiot.
She would eat pinecones.
And I didn't tell her about Aimee
because I didn't want
her thinking she was
- What was your word?
- A replacement.
So thank you for falling right
back into Daddy Lou shoes.
And thank you for never
treating me like a child.
Take some lessons, Louis.
[ARMAND] Are you thinking
of coming back to Paris?
Trash piles and men who smell
like cheese? Non, merci. No.
- We're going to wander.
- [LOUIS] Wander?
- Mm-hm.
- [LOUIS CHUCKLES]
Wander?
- This one?
- Mm-hm.
She of the straight line to
the next X on the map?
This is the X, Louis.
Alright. Okay, well to finding the X.
- [MADELEINE] Santé !
- Santé !
How do you like my coffin?
I wake up at night and the
Phams aren't trading insults,
Estelle isn't smearing
makeup all over herself
- or humming off-key.
- [CLAUDIA] Singing off-key.
No one is forcing me to
listen to their gossips
or solve their petty crises.
It's bliss.
Still, we didn't make it easy for you.
I'm sorry for that.
You alright there?
I cannot read your mind.
The architects of our, uh [COUGHS]
I made you, that's just the way it is.
Yes, but I feel you, Louis.
I feel you too, Madeleine.
I told Claudia I can
feel you love her
and we should see him once more.
I'm glad you did.
I'm glad we did this.
I can feel you too.
Through him.
- Yes, he loves you.
- Okay.
Okay, well, let's get the
hell out of my soul!
[LAUGHTER]
He gets enough affection.
I don't need his head getting
too big to get out the door.
Taking a stretch.
Order me another, love.
There he goes.
- Mm-hm, there he goes!
- [LAUGHTER]
Will he get through the
door with that big head?
[LAUGHTER]
[MADELEINE LAUGHS]
Why don't you want him to know
how much you love him?
[LOUIS] That's a little personal.
- He knows.
- [MADELEINE] Uh-huh.
[LOUIS] He knows.
[TENSE MUSIC]
[DAUNTING MUSIC]
They gave him a choice.
He chose.
[SANTIAGO] Ladies and gentlemen!
Mesdames et messieurs !
Offal and offalesses!
And all those who flourish
outside the divide, welcome.
For 150 years, we here at
the Theatre Des Vampires
- have shown you "you".
- [AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
Your obscene predilections,
your savage desires.
But today, we're shunting
human affairs aside.
So if you want to kill your
lover or fuck your mother,
it'll have to wait.
[AUDIENCE LAUGHS]
Because today
we're turning our lurid
spotlight on ourselves!
I stand before you in broad daylight
at this first ever matinee
at the Theatre Des Vampires
to perform for your
salacious gratification
[AUDIENCE] Yes!
us!
Are you ready, you filthy animals?
- [AUDIENCE SHOUTING] Yes!
- Yes?
- [CHEERING AND APPLAUSE]
- Yes?
[WHISTLING AND CHEERING]
The jury may be seated!
[CHEERING AND APPLAUSE]
[DRAMATIC CLASSICAL MUSIC]
- [SANTIAGO] Whoa!
- [CELESTE] Advocat!
Read the crimes for which this
iniquitous trio stand accused.
[SANTIAGO SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY ON STAGE]
the making of a vampire
from a mortal child.
Ten minutes to your entrance,
Monsieur Lioncourt.
[SANTIAGO] of the vampires to
the mortal, Madeleine Eparvier.
[ROMAINE] Monsieur Lioncourt?
- [SANTIAGO] Finally, the most
- [LESTAT] Thank you.
[SANTIAGO] the heretical
desecration of Law Five
[LESTAT] Ten minutes.
[SANTIAGO] The pre-meditated murders
of the vampiress Antoinette Brown
and the vampire Lestat de Lioncourt.
[MUSIC STOPS ABRUPTLY]
LOUIS: We were on trial for murder
and all I could think was
♪
he's coming.
SANTIAGO: Lestat de
Lioncourt, the victim.
It's justice for the attempted
murder of my being.
guilty
♪
Aah!
or not guilty?
- Mmm.
- Who funds you guys?
Do you work with nation states?
I think the stakes for
Molloy in Episode 6
really begin to ramp up.
I mean, it doesn't help that
the Talamasca is telling him
that things are getting intense.
Can you protect me?
Oh!
From being killed?
No. We're particularly poor
at keeping our assets alive.
But also, he's really making headway.
And he's an experienced
enough journalist to know
that with powerful people,
they're liable to lash out.
So I think, yeah, there's real fear.
And you can see it in Eric's performance
that he's still cracking wise,
but it may not be quite as convincing.
I wanna get out alive.
You fear Armand.
You should fear the other one.
Imagine a tightrope walker.
He knows that he knows
how to walk a tightrope.
But every once in a while,
he glances down,
and a little shiver goes
through his stomach,
that cold chill.
Rashid.
Did you and Mr. Molloy talk
to anyone during dinner?
As soon as he gets an inkling
that they know, he's already working on
how to manipulate it and spin a new web.
Why do you ask love?
Louis' known for a long time
that there's something wrong.
There's a lie being told,
and that penthouse in
Dubai is a bit of a prison,
and I think Louis and Daniel
throughout the years
have been like sort of
kept things for Armand.
♪
[CHOKING]
MARK: Claudia revealing
that she's a vampire
shows how comfortable she is
revealing that to another person.
Don't run.
DELAINEY: I think it's really beautiful
that she gives Madeleine the choice
on how to react to her being a vampire.
I'm gonna clean up.
They have such amazing chemistry.
I was just drawn to
what they were doing.
Is it romantic?
- No.
- No.
- Not yet.
- She likes her so much
and sees that there's something in her
that she's actually like,
"Here's me in all my entirety.
What are you going to do now?
You have a choice to make."
I feel like I get to pick
one thing for myself.
And it's her.
Louis turns Madeleine without doubt
because he loves Claudia.
And that's what he wants to do for her.
LOUIS: You think you're
happy with me now?
Can you imagine me
without the burden of her?
Claudia's very good at reading people.
She knows that she can convince Louis.
You're going to do it?
Yes.
- When?
- Tonight.
The reason that Louis does it is
because they're reaching that stage
where they're growing apart now,
and it's like, oh, okay, so once
we do this, we're done.
JACOB: Turning Madeleine was
a really beautiful moment
for Madeleine and Claudia,
and I was just thinking, like,
I just don't want to get in the way.
I'm gonna go crazy if we don't start.
- Yeah, me, too.
- And I couldn't anyway.
What they're doing is so magnetic.
If you get scared, you
just look at that light.
Working with Kat, who was
our intimacy coordinator,
we worked on, like, levels of distance
between like mouth to neck.
[BOTH GASPING]
When we see Louis take
a bite of Madeleine,
it's like Claudia's hunger
takes over, as well,
and she gets involved.
JACOB: I love that scene.
I love that relationship.
Those two characters deserve more
than any of the characters in the show
to just be able to live,
like, an eternal life,
companionship together.
[GASPS]
♪
MADELEINE: Flowers
growing from the dead.
Cold things becoming warm.
The scene in the cafe where
they, like, meet up
To finding the X.
seems like a romantic comedy
or like a family Thanksgiving.
Everyone's getting back
together, and it's awkward,
and you feel the tensions.
You alright there?
The sets were beautiful.
They built a cafe, with a
band and beautiful lights.
For the Mishka Bar,
named after my eldest dog,
we wanted this almost to
feel like a fever dream,
but really playing with light and space
in a way that connects kind of deeply
with what's happening with the scene.
And we got to do a bit of improvising
in that scene, as well.
I got to shout things at Armand.
Will he get through the
door with that big head?
- [LAUGHTER]
- DELAINEY: Filming it was so bittersweet,
because we were having
such a lovely dinner,
and then it all goes
♪
Gustav was the vampire
that kidnaps Claudia.
And you can hear Louis
screaming for Claudia.
Louis' just, like, missile
focused on Claudia.
He's like, how do I get
her out of this situation?
I have to give massive props
to the background actors on our show
who would just like, be
completely still in place
and just do it again and again
and again and again and again.
[CHEERS AND APPLAUSE]
I think pissed doesn't really
cover how Louis feels
- when they're kidnapped.
- The jury may be seated.
MAN: 10 minutes to your
entrance, Monsieur Lioncourt.
Lestat returns for the trial.
Thank you.
He's back in all his kind of
hectic, complicated glory.
What is he going to do?
EMCEE: And the vampire
Lestat de Lioncourt.
♪