Nicolas Cage Actually Drank Human Blood During Renfield
Nicolas Cage ended up drinking some of his own blood during the filming of Renfield, due to being cut by his fang mouthpiece.
Nicolas Cage recently revealed that he inadvertently ended up drinking real human blood during the filming of his new vampire movie Renfield, in which he portrays the legendary Dracula. In a Reddit AMA alongside his co-star Nicholas Hoult, Cage answered the question “Was any real blood consumed in the making of this film?” by revealing that the prosthetic teeth he wore caused him to gash himself open and swallow some of his own blood during filming. Specifically, Nicolas Cage said that the Renfield “fangs were genuine fangs, they were ceramic and quite pointy. So I did bite my lip a few times which made me drink my own blood.”
The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent actor was also specific in saying that he did not drink blood for any “reason in terms of method,” but fans can be forgiven for presuming that Nicolas Cage might have been consuming human blood on purpose on Renfield. Famously, during the filming of the 1988 psychological thriller film Vampire’s Kiss, Cage consumed a real, living cockroach (or technically, a “water bug”) for a scene, although nobody asked him to. In fact, the original scene was supposed to involve his increasingly deranged character eating a raw egg, but the actor felt it was not intense enough.
Interestingly, Nicolas Cage’s famed cockroach consumption might be subtly paid homage to in Renfield. As seen in the trailer, Nicholas Hoult’s titular character eats an insect in order to basically gain superpowers and defeat a bunch of bad guys; it is explained as a “gift” that Dracula has given his minion, presumably allowing him to use the life force of bugs to make him one of the X-Men (a familiar role for Hoult). It is also a reference to the character of Renfield in Bram Stoker’s original novel Dracula consuming insects to emulate the master vampire, but hard not to draw a parallel.
Not to be outdone by Nicolas Cage in the Renfield AMA, Hoult also answered the question by saying “I quite like the taste of my own blood,” which raises more questions but is probably best left alone. Cage is a famously intense and committed actor, so it is not all that surprising that he put up with some blood in his mouth; according to director Chris McKay, the star of Bringing Out the Dead remained in character as the undead count even during discussions on the direction and after shooting. While Cage likes to refer to his acting style as “nouveau Shamanism,” it is hard not to compare that to the much-debated Method system in vogue over the last several decades.
We have recently opined that Nicolas Cage should not stop at playing Count Dracula in Renfield, but should eventually play each of the iconic Universal Monsters, from Frankenstein to Wolf-Man. It would be interesting to see how Cage’s dietary habits might change from creature to creature, but without a doubt, he would give it his all. Renfield is scheduled to arrive in theaters on April 14, and will co-star Awkwafina, Ben Schwartz, and Brandon Scott Jones.
