The Very First Dracula

In these pages, we have more than once discussed the importance of Derby’s very own version of Dracula, the suave and debonair Count who stepped onto the stage in 1924. We’ve also taken some time to look at 1922’s German feature Nosferatu, and the long copyright battle that surrounded it. That movie took some of its stylistic notes from 1920’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, but there is another step between those two movies that is worth mentioning – Hungary’s Drakula halála from 1921.

Sadly, there’s a fairly limited amount that I can say here, as the movie is effectively lost – a fate that very nearly befell Nosferatu. The movie itself was directed by Károly Lajthay, who had been involved in a number of silent films throughout the 1910s and was still directing all the way into the 1940s. The title translates as Dracula’s Death, and the story follows a young girl, Mary Land, whose father has been placed in an insane asylum. It is here that she meets a man who claims to be Dracula – and the Count himself takes a great romantic interest in Mary after her father’s death.

Unfortunately, Drakula halála is anything but alone, as a huge amount of Hungarian silent cinema is also lost to time. But in this case, we at least have some remnants left behind – there are a number of stills and photos of the movie, and we have a novelisation of the film by József Sívó and László Tamásfi, which you can easily get hold of today. As you will no doubt detect, this was never intended to be a straight Dracula adaptation but a fresh spin on the character, something we would see plenty more of in times to come. More recently, we have seen a graphic novel adaptation of the film, adapted by Nasser Rabadi and Vic King, under the title of Asyl.

One final, fascinating fact for me is about the script itself – director Lajthay co-wrote the script with Mihály Kertész, better known to US audiences as none other than Michael Curtiz, for whom Drakula halála was his penultimate writing effort before a long and storied career in directing. His work through the 30s, 40s, and 50s took in Doctor X, The Adventures of Robin Hood, Mildred Pierce, White Christmas, and not forgetting one of the finest films ever made, Casablanca. He is still renowned as one of the most prolific directors of all time, with almost 180 directing credits according to IMDb.

There is something about this lost version of Dracula that I find fascinating, partly because of just how early it was, as well as its seemingly apt comparisons to movies like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and Nosferatu. It seems very doubtful now that a version will ever be found, but the fragments that remain paint what could have been another piece of fascinating Dracula media to add to an already rich pantheon of work.