Renfield star Ben Schwartz teases a big scene he’s about to film with Nicolas Cage’s Dracula. The famed monster movie sidekick finally gets his own spotlight film after all these years, with Nicholas Hoult in the title role. Renfield also stars Cage as Renfield’s employer Dracula, along with Awkwafina, Schwartz as mobster Teddy Lobo, Adrian Martinez, Shohreh Aghdashloo and Bess Rous.
That loaded cast has in fact been brought together for a comedic take on Renfield and Dracula that was originally pitched by The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman. According to Kirkman, the movie is “an extremely violent comedy” that’s “about [Renfield] being Dracula’s henchman and how sh–ty a job that is.” Set in the present day, Renfield sees Dracula’s apparently miserable lackey falling for Awkwafina’s “feisty” traffic officer Rebecca Quincy and discovering there might actually be more to life than taking orders from a centuries-old vampire. Further details about Renfield are largely being kept under wraps, but fans did recently get their first glimpse of Cage’s outrageous-looking Dracula thanks to leaked set photos.
Teasers for Renfield clearly are being doled out with the utmost care in order to preserve the veil of secrecy around the film. But Cage’s co-star Schwartz did offer a small taste of what’s to come during a recent podcast appearance, where he talked in very cautious and vague terms about a scene he’s set to film where his character Teddy Lobo interacts with Dracula. Schwartz said (via Radio 1’s Screen Time):
There’s one exchange between me and Dracula that I’ve been waiting for since the second I got the script. And I will tell you exactly what it is when I see you. I can’t wait. So I’m just counting down the days for this. We have a couple full scenes together but there’s a back and forth that in my head I’m like, “I cannot wait to say this and get the response from Dracula.” So that’s coming up very soon.
Those words obviously don’t give audiences all that much to chew on when it comes to Renfield story details. In the same interview, Schwartz did also talk about doing a table read with Cage in which the Dracula actor “crushed it.” Schwartz also praised the film’s director Chris McKay and writer Ryan Ridley, mentioning the latter’s connection to Rick and Morty.
Indeed a one-time Rick and Morty writer being involved with Renfield gives the strongest hint of all as to the movie’s likely tone. Given Ridley’s experience on that popular Adult Swim animated show, the movie no doubt will be wacky and more than a little dark, and possibly peppered with pop culture references. Renfield does not yet have a locked down release date, but work on the film is clearly clipping along, with some big scenes involving Cage’s Dracula set to be filmed next week according to Schwartz. And it seems these scenes will also be a showcase for Schwartz’s character, with at least one potentially explosive exchange between Teddy Lobo and Renfield’s boss.
