Nosferatu Reimagining Set to Add Nicholas Hoult

The Witch and The Northman director Robert Eggers’ new take on Nosferatu seems to be gaining more steam, as Deadline reports that Nicholas Hoult is in talks to take on a role in the project. Bill Skarsgård and Lily-Rose Depp were announced to be starring in the picture just last week, and while there have been various casting rumors about the project for years, seeing at least somewhat ancillary figures being revealed as in talks for the project would add even more legitimacy to the project finally coming to fruition. This new take on Nosferatu doesn’t yet have a release date.

The new reimagining is “a gothic tale of obsession between a haunted young woman (Depp) in 19th century Germany and the ancient Transylvanian vampire (Skarsgård) who stalks her, bringing untold horror with him.”

The original 1922 film is inspired by Bram Stoker’s Dracula, yet was only an unofficial and unauthorized adaptation of that novel. With Skarsgård reportedly playing the ghoulish Count Orlock, other main characters would be Hutter, who ventures to the castle and whose wife is targeted by the ghoul, and Knock, the real estate agent who sends Hutter on this trek and eventually goes mad in service of his master. Interestingly enough, Hoult stars in the film Renfield about Dracula’s assistant, in which Nicolas Cage plays Dracula. This would make it seem more likely that Hoult would be playing Hutter as opposed to another servant of a vampiric character.

Reports of Eggers developing a new take on Nosferatu began to emerge in the wake of his success with The Witch, which would have starred Anya Taylor-Joy as the female lead. Every time reports about that revival would emerge, a different Eggers project would move forward shortly thereafter and put Nosferatu on the back burner. In addition to Taylor-Joy being attached at various points in time, Willem Dafoe and Harry Styles had both rumored to have been in talks for the project. 

The remake had encountered so many setbacks over the years, Eggers even joked that he thought the production was “cursed.”

“Dude, I don’t know,” Eggers shared with IndieWire when asked about the status of the project. “It’s fallen apart twice. I’ve been trying to get the word out because the word did carry that Harry Styles was going to be in the movie. I just want to be clear that he was going to be Hutter and not Nosferatu himself. “

He added, “I’ve been trying so hard … And I just wonder if [original director F.W.] Murnau’s ghost is telling me, like, you should stop.”

Stay tuned for details on the new Nosferatu.

Are you looking forward to the new film? Let us know in the comments below or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things horror and Star Wars!