Interview: The Cast and Crew of ‘Abraham’s Boys’
There are no garlic cloves or holy water flasks in Abraham’s Boys. Not much bloodsucking or monster hunting either (at least not in the literal sense of the word). And despite it being billed as “A Dracula Story”, there’s no actual Dracula in the film either, even though his presence is very much felt throughout the entire film.
“I think this is much more [than your typical dracula movie], it’s a thinking person’s film,” says star Titus Welliver, who plays the titular Abraham van Helsing, the legendary vampire slayer who first appeared in Bram Stoker‘s iconic 1897 classic novel Dracula. “It is horror, but I think it’s also an art film.”
Directed by Natasha Kermani and adapted from Joe Hill’s short story of the same name, the film reimagines the Van Helsing legacy through the eyes of two sons coming of age in the shadow of a father who might be a hero – or might have lost his grip on reality a long time ago. The film starts shortly after Abraham and his family (his wife Mina and two sons Max and Rudy) move to an isolated farmhouse in the United States to escape the presence of Dracula, who seemingly still has a hold on Mina through a spiritual connection they fostered prior to the events of the film. As more and more people start making their way to the outskirts of the farmhouse, Abraham begins losing his grip on reality, second-guessing their guests, neighbors and even passer-bys, convinced they’re all somehow connected to Dracula. The deeper his paranoia runs, the more tightly he clings to the idea that only he can protect his family, even if it means turning against them.
What begins as a restrained gothic tale set in a farmhouse slowly turns into something far more psychologically charged; a story about lineage, loyalty and the cost of mythmaking. “I loved the simplicity of it,” says Kermani when asked why she decided to adapt Hill’s short story into a film. “Just Max’s story, this very relatable story of a son starting to see his father in a new light.”
Brady Hepner, who plays Max, is no stranger to the Joe Hill universe, having appeared in a small but crucial role in Scott Derrickson‘s 2021 film adaptation of Hill’s short story The Black Phone. “Reading the script Natasha passed on to me felt familiar, and I couldn’t put my finger on why,” he says. “When I saw the name, I looked it up and saw it was in 20th Century Ghosts [the collection of short stories by Hill that also featured The Black Phone], and I was like — no way. Going back and rereading it was super fun, knowing now that I was going to tell this story.”
In The Black Phone, Hepner was on the receiving end of the horror, having starred as juvenile delinquent Vance, one of the victims of the Grabber, the main antagonist in that film. Here, he’s a witness to it, a son watching his father unravel, trying to figure out if the danger is real or if Abraham’s slowly slipping into something darker and entirely his own. “Now Max starts taking his perception of what’s going on into his own hands,” he says. “I think it’s almost Abraham trying to see if Max will step up. And at the end of the film, you kind of see that Abraham’s like, ‘So you finally have done it.’ Max is just a product of all this chaos.”
Welliver, meanwhile, sees Abraham as something closer to a cult leader, a creative decision that largely informed his approach to the character, which is incredibly different than any iteration of Van Helsing previously seen on film. “There’s not a lot of garlic. There’s not a lot of holy water,” he notes. “He keeps his study under lock and key. The reveal of those things is the boys taking this kind of crazy leap.”
That undercurrent of secrecy and indoctrination is what Kermani was most interested in exploring in the film. “Abraham comes in like a cult leader,” she explains. “There’s no questioning his authority. And we see that again and again in our world: when fear is involved and monsters are involved, people line up behind whoever promises certainty.”
Kermani notes that Jocelin Donahue, who stars as Abraham’s long-suffering wife (and the object of Dracula’s obsession and affection) Mina, saw it the same exact way: “She said, ‘So she’s his number one cult member, right?’”
Donahue brings a grounded weariness to the role of Mina, a woman who may have survived Dracula’s bite but hasn’t escaped his grasp. “She’s a survivor, but she’s certainly been declining in her mental health,” says Donahue. “She’s trying to protect her kids. But as she’s getting sicker and sicker, she’s starting to question the explanations Abraham has given.”
There’s one scene in particular that stands out. A quiet moment between mother and son where Mina confesses she never expected to have boys. “That scene is so heartbreaking,” says Donahue. “I’m sure it was very hard for [her to be] brutally honest with him. She says, ‘I always thought I would have daughters, they’re easier to keep safe.’ [That’s] not something you should say to your son. But she’s opening up to him. She’s warning, she’s saying goodbye, she’s reaching out.”
It’s a sentiment Hepner more than agrees with. “Our scenes are very much about context,” he says. “There’s never really a moment where Mina tells Max, ‘You need to get away.’ It’s this internal, motherly-son connection — reading between the lines.”
The cast didn’t have the luxury of rehearsal time. But somehow, that approach ended up working in the long-run. “Our bond really formed in the process of making the film,” says Welliver. “Brady is a very smart actor, a very good listener. That [approach] could’ve been disastrous in less capable hands.”
Even as Abraham’s Boys veers toward madness, it never loses its grip on atmosphere. There’s tension baked into every scene, a kind of quiet, suffocating horror that seeps into every corner of the isolated farmhouse that the Van Helsings find themselves sequestered in. “The house is a character in its own right,” says Welliver. “It’s night of terror, day of weird. This bucolic setting, these rolling hills — and then this gothic farmhouse perched on a hill with a 360-degree view. He wants to see what’s coming. There’s a siege mentality.”
Kermani credits her collaborators with helping bring that sense of unease to life, particularly cinematographer Julia Swain, who imbues the film with a cold, watchful stillness that slowly fractures as the film progresses (and the characters’ mental states start to worsen). “Visually, this film feels like a much bigger film,” agrees Welliver. “There are grace notes Natasha does where the audience goes, ‘Ooh. Did I just see that? Was that something behind her?’ It’s very smart, because she’s very smart.”
Kermani’s next film, The Dreadful, reunites Game of Thrones alums Sophie Turner and Kit Harington. Set in the 15th century during the Wars of the Roses, the film follows Anne and her mother-in-law Morwen whose lives on the outskirts of society are interrupted when someone from their past re-enters their life. “It was like two old friends, brother and sister almost, coming back together,” she says of working with Turner and Harington. “They were both very excited to do something grounded, very different. Maybe a little more grown-up than what we’ve seen them do before.”
As for Abraham’s Boys, it may not be a vampire story in the traditional sense. But that’s exactly what makes it bite.
ABRAHAM’S BOYS is now playing in theaters.