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LOUIS/LOUISE is a vampire of color and actor can be any age. S/He is older than 100 vampire years. S/He should have a melancholy air and alluring presence. Whatever pronouns Louis uses should be the ones used to refer to Lestat.
ARMAND/ARMANDE is a vampire in his/her late teens or early 20s. He should be of Eastern origin, whether that’s Eastern European, East Asian or Middle Eastern. He should have a powerful presence and an expressive face.
DANIEL/DANI is a human in his/her 20s or early 30s. S/He should have an approachable and friendly presence that makes people eager to open up to him/her.
Notes on vampire makeup: Makeup should be subtle: it should not be so pale that it hides original skin tone. It should be clear through the use of contacts, makeup and other effects that these characters are not human.
[The stage is set with a card table CS. There are other beaten up furnishings. Maybe a couch or chair, and old television. There is a coffin that appears to be a long trunk DSL. It is covered with a tablecloth or a piece of lace. Outside the door to the auditorium we hear men talking congenially. The door opens and ARMAND, LOUIS, and DANIEL come in.]
Armand: No, no, you go ahead. [Gives Louis a peck on the cheek and exits back the same way]
Daniel: [intrigued] He your boyfriend?
Louis: Something like that. Come on to my place. Hopefully I’ve got something that’ll please you just fine.
Daniel: I’m sure you do.
[The two walk up to the stage and Louis picks up a leather backgammon case with a flourish]
Daniel: More old fashioned foreplay than I expected, but I dig it.
Louis: Nothing old fashioned about all this. [He opens the case to reveal an assortment of drugs: pills, powders, and syringes.]
Daniel: Man, where did—are you sure you’re not a narc?
Louis: [Lays the case on the table CS] Furthest from it. I promise.
[Daniel gives one last wary look then breaks down and goes for the cocaine, prepping it like an expert. Louis watches, fascinated, as though he’s never done the drug himself. Daniel takes a hit and offers to Louis.]
Louis: No. Thanks. [He is suddenly withdrawn, less friendly.]
[Daniel stands up and starts to take off his shirt. Louis startles.]
Louis: What are you doing?
Daniel: Giving you what you want?
Louis: [laughs darkly, shakes his head.] That is something I could have any night. You offer a unique experience.
[Daniel looks wary again]
Louis: Don’t be afraid. If I’d wanted you dead I would have done it already. You followed me here to this house. Alone. Then you took from me drugs that could have been laced with anything. I assure you. I want you alive. I want this opportunity.
Daniel: [still wary] What opportunity?
Louis: The interview, Daniel, of course.
Daniel: Right, yeah, of course. [rights his shirt, pulls out his phone, fumbles with it] Yeah, so um, tell me about you. This place. This where you live?
[Louis sits at the table and Daniel follows suit, lighting a cigarette.]
Louis: No. I own many of these places. Investment properties around the city. You saw my friend earlier. He’s at our home.
Daniel: Got it. You’ve got an eye for things other people don’t see any value in. Places like this.
Louis: [lost in thought] Yes. Value is subjective. What this generation values will be tossed away all too soon in favor of the newest trend. And it is a cycle which never ends.
Daniel: You’re different here than you were at the Pink Baby. Darker, more…verbose. I like it.
Louis: [mirthless smile] Do you? Start recording.
Daniel: Shit. Thought I had. [taps his phone’s screen to start recording] So this is just a place? Where’s home?
Louis: [boldly] I’m a vampire.
Daniel [laughing] I’m interested to find out why you think that.
[Louis bares his fangs and lunges rapidly at Daniel.]
Daniel: Shit! Jesus! [Stands, knocks down chair, moves SR] Jesus.
[Louis stays still, fangs bared, waiting for Daniel to come back. Daniel does. Touches a fang and gasps. Pulls back.]
Daniel: Fangs. Shit. [Sits and takes another long drag of his cigarette.] So…how’d it happen. The fangs?
Louis: [Sits too and sighs.] It was a boy. Of course. But how was I to know what kind of boy he was at the time? I see a blond with eyes like a stormy ocean. How was I to know he was the devil? He tracked me down. He watched me. Then, when he knew me well enough to know just what to say, he cornered me and made me come to him.
Daniel: What did he say?
Louis: [Remembering it. Seeing it.] He said he’d take away the pain. I was ready for that. My brother was dead. It was my fault. I’d worked Paul up into a rage. He was always delicate. “Louis,” he’d say, “I can’t abide the idea of Grace getting married to a Baptist. It ain’t right by God. Ain’t right by Maman.” There was nothing right by God except whatever Paul thought was right. I’d done what I could to salvage our family fortune after my Father had run the plantation into the ground. But Paul said it’d be best to sell it all and move to Paris, of all places, to do God's work. Missionaries. Paris. If only I’d known…I told him he was mad. Crazy. I was the one who’d saved the family. If it hadn’t been for me we’d all be in the poor house by now. He stormed off and…sometimes I think that…That was God. [deeply emotional] That was God speaking through my brother. “Go. Run. Save yourself from the devil.” But I didn’t heed the call. And my brother fell and my mother never forgave me.
Daniel: Fell from where? Like jumped?
Louis: [pacing, agitated] Doesn’t matter. He…was dead. And I… wanted to be. Out drinking every night. Ready for it to be over. Ready for anyone to end it for me because I couldn’t end it myself. And that was when he came for me.
Daniel: The vampire?
Louis: Lestat. [Stands and moves CS speaking to the audience.] Lestat de Lioncourt. I’d never met anyone like him. New Orleans, that’s where we lived, back then was not so different from how it is now. There were always people coming and going: new folks from hundreds or even thousands of miles away. People who came from slave roots [motions to himself]. People who came direct from Africa, from Europe. It was a cosmopolitan place. A crossroads of the Old and New World. Lestat was Old World. I had no idea how old. No wonder he stood out, no wonder he was something altogether different. [As Louis describes Lestat he takes on his characteristics] The way he smiled, the way he moved. “Mon Cher,” he said to me and I felt myself go to pieces. He followed me home, cornered me in the carriageway of my townhouse. I drew my dagger [he mimes it] and then he laughed. [Mimics a goofy, maniacal sort of laugh] “Louis, Louis, you’d need more than that to kill me. Besides, I’m the answer to your prayers.” [Louis drops the Lestat persona and wanders back to the table to sit]
Daniel: So you fucked?
Louis: Yes.
[Daniel lights another cigarette]
Louis: I’d never done it with a man. I…[beat] Only it was more than that. He drank my blood but I didn’t know it at the time. It was only later, looking back that I realized he’d done it.
Daniel: What was it like? Him drinking from you?
Louis: [defensively] We didn’t share blood often once he made me as he was.
Daniel: But you said you realized it looking back. What was it like?
Louis: [leans across the table toward Daniel] Better than anything else. I assume you’re not a virgin.
Daniel: What? Um, no, I’m not.
Louis: When Lestat took my blood, I was willing to give it all to him. I would have died for that pleasure, easily. That is, until I felt what it was like to drink the blood myself.
Daniel: Better than sex?
Louis: Oh yes. There is nothing like drinking blood. Lestat…the fact that we lay together meant…he could have just drained my blood, you see, killed me that first night, but he didn’t. What an act of self-control that was.
Daniel: I see what you mean. He could have killed you but he fucked you instead and you wondered why.
Louis: No…I hadn’t begun to question it. After he drank from me that night, all I wanted was to have him again. He had made love to me the way no one ever had, drank some sips of my blood. Then he was gone before the sun rose. Vampires burn like tinder in the sun, and even if we are in the darkness, if the sun shines outside we will be sluggish and drawn to sleep. I didn’t know that at the time. All I knew was that he was gone, and I drank myself into a greater stupor even than ever before. I lost time. Darkness fell again and Lestat came to me. I was so grateful. No one had seen me the way he had. [stands again, propelled by emotion] When we were together, when he met my eyes I knew I had been seen. And that was as terrifying as it was gratifying. I wanted it, yet I feared it.
Daniel: They say that’s the way love is.
Louis: [Snarls, lunging toward him] Love?!
Daniel: [slipping out of his chair scrambling backward, cigarette dropped] Jesus, Man! Cool it!
Louis: [draws back] I apologize. [he sits as though nothing happened] Please. [he motions to the chair]
[Daniel comes back to the chair warily then reaches down to get his cigarette, sticking it back in his mouth]
Louis: It was not…love. It was infatuation. I’d never…Perhaps these days two men might bed one another and it is seen as…In those times, it was unacceptable.
Daniel: How old are you?
Louis: Older than I look. Though I hadn’t lain with a man, I did know it was my inclination. I think that was another reason Paul focused so much of his energy on me. He thought his older brother was going to hell for sinful thoughts. Things I’d never acted on, you understand. But here was Lestat, like a dream, letting me enact all my sinful desires on his perfect, unchanging body.
Daniel: How many nights did he come to you? It’s like a Goddamn fairy tale.
Louis: [laughs] It was! Complete with the dark, bloody ending. I was bewitched by him. He…he would have said he loved me. I feel certain of that. He came to me for about a week. During the days, I drank, and at night Lestat and I were together. He said he could taste the wine in my blood, said it made him woozy. He enjoyed it. But I was unwell. Looking back on it, I was killing myself. Maybe that’s the way he wanted it. [beat] Finally one night, he determined that I would come with him. That I would get a chance to live with him in happiness, able to follow my desires and live as I always had wanted. I would be free of the pain of life, the uncertainty. He assured me I’d be separate from all the petty struggles of humanity. I believed him utterly. He was the Messiah that I’d been waiting for more surely than Jesus Christ himself. And when he drained me of my blood, as I said it was orgasmic. Then he put his wrist to my lips. He told me to drink, and I was intoxicated, I had no choice. I drank. That first gulp was a nightmare. But as soon as I swallowed, the blood was an elixir. And I felt our hearts pounding in rhythm. Like drums. I drank until he bid me stop.
[long pause, Louis drowning in memories]
Daniel: Yeah?
Louis: I started to die. I thought that was it. I thought I’d been tricked. I thought I was such an idiot to believe I’d become immortal. Yet [motions to himself] I did.
Daniel: So vampires are dead. Like zombies.
Louis: [laughing] Not quite Romero.
Daniel: Can you show me your fangs again?
[Louis shows them]
Daniel: Sweet. So…you kill people?
Louis: Almost every night. Lestat… back in those days he killed multiple people sometimes. I…was slow to adjust. He taunted me for it. Made me regret everything. But then he wrapped his arms around me in the coffin, and I was willing to forgive him there in the darkness for a little while.
Daniel: Hold up--coffin?
Louis: Yes. Want to see it? [Looks DSL to a trunk covered with a decorative cloth]
Daniel: [Follows his gaze] Shit.
[Louis stands and tugs the tablecloth off to reveal a very obvious coffin which he then opens. Daniel moves to his side, squats to look inside.]
Daniel: So you’ve fucked in a coffin?
Louis: Many times. My first night as a vampire, Lestat didn’t have a coffin for me so we shared. I hated him then.
Daniel: Why?
Louis: [closes the coffin] Right away I felt cheated. After I died, after I awoke with my vampire eyes, the way the world looked changed forever, yet I stayed the same. The same pain and fear and dread dwelled in me. And now I had to kill to survive. Lestat was a siren who’d lured me to a rocky coastline, and now I would dash my head against it for the rest of eternity.
Daniel: [lights another cigarette] So he lied?
Louis: I don’t think Lestat saw it the same way as I did. To him, being a vampire freed him of human morality. He expected me to feel the same, but it never happened that way for me.
Daniel: Okay, okay, so back up, he turned you into a vampire by having you drink his blood, you climbed into the coffin with him that day…
Louis: He wanted me to love him. He thought that we’d…always be together.
[Louis stays silent for a while and Daniel smokes.]
Daniel: I thought you’d asked me back to your room to…fuck.
Louis: Did I say that?
Daniel: It’s the assumption when a guy gets picked up in a bar like the Pink Baby. So what is love to you? A vampire?
Louis: Love is the same to me as it is to any mortal. Acceptance, a sense of belonging, protection…sex. I never loved Lestat because…He wasn’t those things for me. Very good sex yes, but I never belonged. When I became a vampire, I wasn’t the same kind of vampire as he was. While I was mortal, I worshiped him. I wanted Lestat as I’d never wanted anything. But when we were the same creature, he lost his otherworldly luster. When I became immortal, when my perspective, my place in the world forever changed, how could I think of love between me and Lestat? I wanted to make love to the whole world. But I was a monster. Am I making sense?
Daniel: You’d been given this ability to see in the dark and run fast. You were like a superhero, and this guy, Lestat, wanted you to just be his housewife.
Louis: [laughs] More or less. A part of me wanted to leave New Orleans and go anywhere. But I felt that I was irreparably evil. Why did I deserve to travel the world? By the time I was able to fully question my nature it had been three whirlwind nights, and I had already killed five people. A death sentence had I still been judged as a mortal. And I felt I needed to live that death sentence every night. So I stayed in the townhouse with Lestat. I viewed my life with him as a punishment, as penance for what I’d done. I kept the depth of my despair from him, but I did tell him I no longer wanted to kill humans. I started to kill animals. Rats--there were so many rats in those days--chickens, dogs, whatever I could get. It took a lot of animal blood to sate my hunger. Lestat laughed at me. Told me I would one day come around to it. I did. But by then he was long gone.
Daniel: He left you?
Louis: No. I don’t think he ever would have let me go. No. I…I killed him.
Daniel: Shit. How long were you two together?
Louis: Decades.
Daniel: Stake through the heart?
Louis: No. That wouldn’t necessarily work. Decapitation, fire: those are the surest ways to be rid of a vampire. But we didn’t know that…
Daniel: We?
[Louis stands again and walks to the lip of the stage]
Louis: Surely you have no children, but maybe siblings?.
Daniel: No. No siblings.
Louis: Younger family, perhaps? Cousins?
Daniel: Sure. I got a couple cousins.
Louis: Did you help them learn to read, talk with them about philosophy, teach them how to get along in the world?
Daniel: Nothing like that. Haven’t seen them in a while. Guess we just played together as kids.
Louis: Then you may not be able to understand what I’m about to tell you. The reality-warping condition of parenthood.
Daniel: You’ve got kids? Vampires can knock people up?
Louis: No. She wasn’t my biological daughter. Lestat…made her for me. Claudia was…our child. I loved her as I have loved nothing else in all my life. I feasted on the blood of mortals for her. I still detested it, but Lestat said it was best for her to learn to feed on humans, so I helped her learn it. We taught her. I read to her, he took her to the theatre. We put on little plays in our living room. We were a family.
Daniel: That is absolutely not what I expected you to say.
Louis: [holds an invisible hand and looks down at the ghost of Claudia only he can see] We walked together the three of us, happy as three monsters could be. Lestat had someone to dote on besides me, and that was for the best. I still shied from his affections though I craved them acutely. But Claudia loved his antics. He was her clown and role model. She could be brutal with mortals, and Lestat loved that. She was the pupil he never had with me. I think Lestat cared for her more than me in those days. He loved to watch her hunt.
Daniel: Why’d you kill him?
Louis: [long pause, Louis collecting thoughts] Claudia was so very young when Lestat made her one of us. She was…tortored by it. Aging on the inside and looking out forever from the eyes of a child. She hated him for it, and she wanted to escape him. She wished to travel to Europe. She wanted to see more of our kind. There are many vampires out there, Daniel.
Daniel: Are there more around here?
Louis: In this city? There is a vampire here old enough to scare away most fledglings--young vampires. You see, the majority of vampires don’t live for very long. Immortality is hardly a guarantee. The existential horror I felt at my transformation is enough to end most vampires, I think. Most, therefore, are young. And they fear the older ones. I fear those older than I am. The one other vampire in this city, I fear him. But we respect each other. But in those days, long ago, there were no vampires in New Orleans nor anywhere nearby. Claudia wanted answers desperately, and so did I. Answers about what we were, how vampires came to be. But Lestat had nothing to tell us. He refused to let us go.
Daniel: Did you ever find out? About vampires.
Louis: [walking back to the table] No. All we found when we traveled to Europe, to Paris, was more bloodshed and pain. I’ve begun to think that’s all there is for me: pain. All I deserve.
Daniel: This is the craziest shit I’ve ever heard.
Louis: I imagine so.
Daniel: So where’s Claudia now? Just out doing her own thing?
Louis [pained and angry but trying to contain it] She is gone. She was…a woman trapped in the body of a child. Can you imagine? Almost 40 years she was a vampire, and she was a young girl, younger than 10 when she was made immortal. Trapped in a body like that. Someone once told me she didn’t have a chance. But I don’t believe that. No one I know burned brighter.
Daniel: Burn bright and burn out fast?
Louis: [barely contained fury] No.
[Daniel is frightened by the tone and stands up.]
Louis: I apologize. I asked for this, and now I’ve frightened you again.
[Daniel looks uncomfortable standing up, but also unwilling to go back to the table and leans against a chair or the couch]
Daniel: It’s alright. I just…don’t want you to, like, kill me.
Louis: As I said, I could have done that already. You’re safe. [beat] I should tell you more about Paris. At first we thought it was a dream. We lived contentedly there for many months, Claudia and I. Then we finally met the others.
Daniel: Thought you said you never met others?
Louis: I said we never learned anything new. [beat] Theatre de Vampires.
Daniel: What now?
Louis: I know. It seems impossible, but there was a whole group of vampires performing on the stage. Gruesome morality plays.
Daniel: And no one realized what they were?
Louis: What they were was the whole show. They were vampires pretending to be humans pretending to be vampires. The capstone of each night’s performance was when they showed their true nature. [Louis gets up to illustrate] A mortal, an innocent victim would be brought on from backstage and while they begged for mercy Armand would slowly convince them that they wanted his murderous embrace. “No pain,” he would say, drawing close to them, whispering in their ear. “No pain.” And the poor man or woman would crumple, cry tears of relief, practically beg him to end their life. It was obscene.
Daniel: Armand?
Louis: Their coven leader. He was a revelation. Lestat had been the only other vampire I’d ever met. He was hollow, foolish, extravagant. It seemed the other vampires in the theatre were just the same. Armand was different. He was…powerful, elegant, and the way he killed, convincing the mortals to want it. He enthralled me just as Lestat had enthralled me when I was mortal. That was how great our divide was. I desperately sought Armand’s companionship. Claudia and I sought answers and I hope he could provide them.
Daniel: What do you mean? Like where vampires came from?
Louis: More than that. I suppose that I…[having a realization] I wanted someone to tell me I was not evil. By that point, I was so convinced that I was a demon, a devil. Condemned. Lestat never cared. He was happy to be called a devil. But I wanted someone to tell me that I could… still be good after everything I’d done. Had somoene died for the sins of vampires? Need I only ask for my inherent sins to be forgiven? [Beat] Once, long before this, I’d gone to confession, and the priest had thought I was a lunatic. He didn’t believe what I was. So in Armand, I think I wanted someone to believe me, absolve me of my sins.
Daniel: What happened to the priest?
Louis: [pointedly ignores him] Armand wasn’t able to give me this absolution. But he did give me companionship that I hadn’t ever had. We were candid with one another in a way Lestat and I never had been.
Daniel: So, was he your boyfriend?
Louis: Not as such, no. Companion, partner. But I could never forgive him after what transpired in Paris.
Daniel: [tentatively] What happened?
[Louis comes back to the table, tries to ground himself and focus. Performs some kind of stimming activity]
Louis: Vampires can read minds, Daniel.
[Daniel looks uncomfortable with that]
Louis: I’ve been able to see your thoughts all night. I have done my best to avoid them, but sometimes they’re loud.
Daniel: Thanks for trying, I guess.
Louis: These vampires, they read our minds. They saw what happened to Lestat. What we did. They didn’t approve. But more than that, Armand was possessive. I see that now. He wanted me all to himself. Claudia was also possessive, and the two of them never got along. [long beat] They came for us in our rooms. Hauled us through the back streets until we were down there in those catacombs below the theatre. They dragged me away from Claudia. I was screaming and screaming her name. I can still hear her cries in my mind. I was her father. I was everything to her. I was supposed to protect her. They locked me away. Trapped me in an iron coffin. I thought I would die there. I called out for help until the sun rose. When I awakened at sunset I found Armand there leaning over me. His face was painted with false regret. They had killed her. Chained her in the sun.
Daniel: Jeez, I’m sorry.
Louis: Armand claimed he had nothing to do with it, but I know it’s a lie. He was the coven master. Anything they did had his blessing.
Daniel: So what happened then, what did you do? What did Armand do?
Louis: Armand did nothing. I made a plan. I made probably the only plan I’ve ever made. I determined that I would destroy them. Right before sunrise I made my move. I was so exhausted by the rising sun I could barely move, but it was the only way to do it. I poured kerosene over their coffins, I splashed it on the stage curtains. Then I tipped the braziers over, spilling the coals and flames. I didn’t expect to survive, but when I staggered out into the grey of early dawn, Armand saved me. My heart was utterly broken. My soul was crushed. My resolve shattered. All the fight was gone from me. So I stayed with him.
Daniel: With Armand?
Louis: Yes. And I thought of Lestat. I think I wronged him. All Lestat wanted was my love, my acceptance. I couldn’t give it.
Daniel: Stayed with Armand for how long?
Louis: Let me get you something to drink.
[Louis exits SL Daniel looks unsure while Louis is gone. Louis comes back and sets a bottle and opener on the table in front of Daniel.]
Daniel: Thanks.
[Daniel pops it open and cuts his finger on the cap without noticing]
[Louis watches the blood, fascinated]
Daniel: You couldn't have stayed with that asshole long. I mean…Here you were with, like, superpowers. All this knowledge, all these things you’ve seen. No medical bills, no food bills. Nothing tying you down. You could do anything.
Louis: [watching the blood] We moved all around for a while before settling in San Francisco.
[Louis rises from the table, moving around to Daniel, watching the blood drip. Daniel notices the blood and leaps up in fear as Louis continues to approach him.]
Daniel: Shit, man, no, fuck. [backs away and falls over the coffin, beer bottle clatters away.]
Louis: I think I said before: I don’t have the compunctions about consuming human blood that I once did. We’re all condemned. All forsaken by God. Every human died with Claudia.
Daniel: [scrambling to sit up] Man, please, if you’re gonna drink my blood, make me a vampire!
Louis: [still stalking, crouching over the coffin like a giant cat] You would do it? Even after I said that immortality isn’t a guarantee, that you’ll kill every night to survive. You would do that? So selfish?
Daniel: [more bravely and with resolve] You said that we’re all condemned by God, so why not?
[Louis lunges and bites Daniel’s neck. Hurried steps are heard front of house and ARMAND enters from the door to the auditorium and throws them apart. Daniel crawls away and Louis hisses and bares his fangs at Armand.]
Louis: Leave me alone!
Armand: It’s nearly dawn! And here you are fangs-deep in another one without me.
Louis: You didn’t want to join us!
Armand: And why should I? Only to hear about Lestat again and again. He’s a broken record isn’t he, Daniel?
[Daniel is struggling to get to his feet, trying to get away. Armand moves rapidly to his side, pulls him up.]
Armand: I asked you a question.
Daniel: You’re the other one. The old one. Armand. Don’t kill me. I wanna be like you.
Armand: [laughs and drops him, whirls on Louis who is leaning on a chair or the table] Failed again, Louis. Failed to convince yet another boy that you are cursed and condemned. Though you did try harder this time. You told him all about Lestat’s seductive powers. How that man lured you away from the waking world, how all his transgressions were forgiven when he embraced you and gave you his--
Louis: Enough! Lestat’s nothing, Armand!
Armand: He’s everything! [Mockingly] “All he wanted was for me to love him” Bah! [Beat] And what if I do it? Turn this boy into one of us?
Louis: No! Daniel: Yes!
Armand: I should be the one who does it, after all. My blood is stronger.
[Daniel gets up shakily, supports himself with furniture and makes it to Armand. Blood is oozing down his neck]
Daniel: Please. I can’t go on living knowing there’s this whole world I can’t be a part of.
Armand: [draws him close, cradles him] Yes. Come here now. You wish to open your eyes to the whole world?
Louis: Don’t! Please, you can’t do it.
[Armand looks pointedly at Louis then bites into Daniel’s neck. He drinks for an uncomfortably long time. Then he slices his wrist and brings it to Daniel's mouth. Daniel drinks reluctantly at first then grips his arm passionately and drinks until Armand pulls him away. Daniel immediately starts convulsing. It should look terrible and painful. He crawls off SR. Louis has been transfixed during the exchange of blood but now begins pacing and stimming.]
Louis: No, no, no, no…
Armand: [composure broken] Will this finally make amends? Will this set it all right? You talked with him all night in a bar, all night here! Perhaps he will make you happy since I cannot.
Louis: I don’t want that!
Armand: [calming, moving to the table, lighting up a cigarette Daniel left behind.] What do you want, Louis? I tire of asking. I’ve given you all you desire.
Louis: You took away all that mattered!
[Beat]
Armand: You matter.
[Daniel enters SR. He is transformed. He looks at his hands, at the audience, at the furniture, enraptured by the beauty of everything. Louis is horrified and Armand is smoking. Louis comes to Daniel and takes his shoulders.]
Daniel: Wow, Louis, you’re so…you’re even more beautiful now. Your eyes and your skin. [strokes Louis’ face gently.] It’s like you’re glowing! [his hand slides to his throat] And your neck.
[Daniel is overtaken by hunger and bites Louis’ neck. Louis doesn’t stop him. He falls to his knees and Daniel keeps drinking. Armand watches, face pained yet fascinated. Finally Daniel pulls back leaving Louis laying on the floor obviously alive. Daniel stands, flexes his fingers, looks around again.]
Armand: How do you feel? [snuffs the cigarette]
Daniel: Amazing. This is awesome.
Armand: Perhaps you’re ready to take life. [looks out at the audience] There are plenty of mortals out there. Pick one.
[Daniel moves to the lip of the stage, regarding the audience.]
Daniel: Anyone?
Armand: Anyone. You kill them and you will live. Is it a worthwhile trade? Is that not how humans survive? Killing.
[It seems to be sinking in to Daniel as he looks out at the audience and looks more and more disturbed.]
Armand: Is it worth it? To have these “super powers” as you call them. Or will you choose to perish?
[Daniel looks frantic and finally runs down the aisle and out the entrance to the front of house. Armand watches him, unmoving, and Louis pulls himself up from the floor.]
Louis: What have you done?
Armand: I’ll see you at home.
[Armand exits after Daniel]
[Louis looks around, distraught. Looks like he wants to talk to the audience, but changes his mind, paces again before stopping and looking down at Daniel’s phone on the table, still recording. He sits at the table, calms himself.]
Louis: I…never asked for this. I said “yes,” but I didn't know what I had consented to. Lestat wanted me to stay with him, but what did I want? Who am I? I search for others to make me in their image, to complete me, but everywhere I look I see nothing but my own monstrosity reflected.
[Louis picks up the phone and taps the screen. We hear “recording deleted.” Then we hear Daniel’s anguished scream coming from front of house. Louis’ head whips in that direction and lights out.]