Nicolas Cage plays Dracula (!) to a fed up familiar in new Renfield trailer

We repeat: Nic! Cage! plays! Dracula! Is there anything more we really need to say?

By Emma Keates  |  January 5, 2023 | 4:46pm
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Nicolas Cage plays Dracula (!) to a fed up familiar in new Renfield trailer
Nicolas Cage and Nicholas Hoult in Renfield Photo: Michael K. Short/Universal Pictures

The premise for Universal’s new horror-comedy, Renfield, sounds like it was plucked directly from film Twitter’s list of wildest fantasies (or potentially just the brain of someone after one too many edibles): “what if there was a What We Do In The Shadows-style vampire workplace comedy, but it was about actual Dracula, and Dracula was played by Nicolas Cage?”

Well, folks, get ready to hide your carotid arteries because it’s all happening. And it’s as deeply, weirdly, and beautifully Cagey as you’d expect.

Renfield | Official Trailer

All that juicy Cage goodness doesn’t come until the end of the trailer. First, we have to meet his beleaguered familiar Guillermo Renfield, played by an equally well-cast Nicholas Hoult (The Menu, The Great). He’s joined a support group because he needs to “get out of a toxic relationship.” His boss, Nic Cage-ula, gives him special, murder-y powers, and in return, Renfield delivers him specific victim orders like “a busload or cheerleaders” or “a handful of nuns.”

“You’re like the guy that gets the villain’s Postmates,” remarks a cop buddy (played by Awkwafina) who for some reason didn’t immediately phone the FBI when she found out vampires were real. (Although, let’s be honest, we probably wouldn’t have either if they were, you know, Nicolas Cage).

Finally, at the end of the trailer, Nic is accidentally invited into the support group’s gym, where he proceeds to hover over their terrified heads and utter the immortal words: “I am Dracula.” It’s not quite “not the bees, ahhhhh,” but come on, he has fangs this time. We have no doubt that Renfield will be a worthy and glorious addition to the Cage-iverse.

Renfield premieres in theaters April 14.

 
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