Interview with the Vampire (TV Series)

... After the Phantoms of Your Former Self (2022)

Sam Reid: Lestat de Lioncourt

Photos 

Quotes 

• Lestat de Lioncourt : There is one thing about being a vampire that I most fear above all else... and that is loneliness. You can't imagine the emptiness. A void stretching out for decades at a time. You take this feeling away from me, Louis. We must stay together and take precaution... and never part.

• Lestat de Lioncourt : You'll see as your powers grow, you can see their thoughts, like a one-reeler almost. Dull, monotonous picture shows. It's a very distracting gift, the petty musings of meat.

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : Peel back on me then. What am I thinkin' right now?

  Lestat de Lioncourt : You'll have to tell me yourself. A sacrifice is made when the Dark Gift is shared.

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : You can't read my mind anymore?

  Lestat de Lioncourt : The architects of our creation mean to humble us. We're at the mercy of the other's discretion.

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : Just like the meat.

  Lestat de Lioncourt : You're not one of them anymore, fledgling. You chase after phantoms of your former self. I'll break you of it.

• Louis de Pointe du Lac : How many of us are out there? We can't be the only ones.

  Lestat de Lioncourt : How many vampires? Not many, I'm afraid. Maybe a hundred... A hundred and one.

• Louis de Pointe du Lac : What's happening?

  Lestat de Lioncourt : Your body is confused. Your lungs feel like water, your heart, fire. You feel as if you're dying... Because you are.

• Lestat de Lioncourt : When I first started learning English, I abhorred it. Every word felt like a doorknob falling out of my mouth. Chapeau was a hat, étoile was a star, a pamplemousse was a grapefruit...

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : Killin' folks ain't a second language!

  Lestat de Lioncourt : ...but, but! When I started dreaming in English, that's when I embraced it. And now I have English consonants to thank for this astonishing jawline.

• Louis de Pointe du Lac : You should just throw me in the incinerator, make another one.

  Lestat de Lioncourt : What a waste that would be. I have two centuries walked this earth and can report, you have no twin. No one as angry, as stubborn, as unaccommodating, as maddening...

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : Sound like trash to me.

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : ...as loving, as dedicated, as thoughtful, as imperfectly perfect as you've become. You're a challenge every sunset, Saint Louis, and I'd have it no other way.

• Lestat de Lioncourt : Hunting is an art. You have the power to subdue anyone you want, but sometimes restraint is your most powerful weapon.

• Louis de Pointe du Lac : Why do you do this, Lestat?

  Lestat de Lioncourt : Well, I like to do it. I enjoy it.

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : Well, I don't. You don't have to humiliate him.

  Lestat de Lioncourt : [shouts]  Well, I don't say that you have to enjoy it! Kill them swiftly if you have to, but do it! Embrace what you are! You are a killer, Louis!

• Lestat de Lioncourt : If you listen to me, if you finally submit to your nature, you will be filled, Louis, with all the life you can hold. You will see death in all its beauty, life as it is only known at the very point of death. You alone, of all creatures, can see death with that impunity. You alone, under the rising moon, can strike like the hand of God.

• Lestat de Lioncourt : I realize the hypocrite I am, emphasizing cleanliness after I overindulged, but a proper disposal is the penance of a sated vampire. And you won't always have a conveniently-located graveyard nearby.

• [as the tenor sings out of tune] 

  Lestat de Lioncourt : I don't understand how someone like that can make it onto a stage. I understand they're a rogue company, but are they pulling talent from roadside gas stations?

• [disposing of a body] 

  Lestat de Lioncourt : This was your man's esquire sent in his stead.

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : I was hungry.

  Lestat de Lioncourt : A stone's throw from your place of business. What were you thinking?

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : He disrespected me.

  Lestat de Lioncourt : How did he do that?

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : He said I did a good job.

  Lestat de Lioncourt : You are a library of confusion!

• Lestat de Lioncourt : Here's an idea: let's take a holiday. How about Rome?

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : Rome? Rome, Italy?

  Lestat de Lioncourt : Would you prefer Rome, Wisconsin?

• Lestat de Lioncourt : A couple of parish priests go missing, people say, 'Fine. Most likely kid fiddlers.' But this, this was an important man in town. The police will be looking for this man, fledgling!

  Lestat de Lioncourt : [gesturing to the incinerator]  That's why we got this beast, yeah?

  Lestat de Lioncourt : No, you need to show restraint, fledgling!

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : Oh, you need to stop using that word right now, 'cause it's soundin' a little like 'slave.'

  Lestat de Lioncourt : Don't say it...

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : Well, that's what it fuckin' sound like. That's what it feel like sometimes.

  Lestat de Lioncourt : And the carousel comes around again.

  Louis de Pointe du Lac : Fuck you!

  Lestat de Lioncourt : Va te faire foutre aussi!

• Lestat de Lioncourt : The sun gives life to everything but us. I should have told you that. The life of a vampire has its challenges and its rewards. But I think New Orleans, with its music, culture, cuisine, shipping yards, conventioneers, thrill-seeking tourists far-flung from their homes, the laissez-faire attitude of the local police force...

  [chuckles] 

  Lestat de Lioncourt : Oh yes, the perfect setting for a vampire home... a vampire romance.