Earlier this year it was announced that AMC had acquired the rights to Anne Rice’s catalogue of works including The Vampire Chronicles and the trilogy Lives of the Mayfair Witches, and it now appears that both properties have been given series orders with AMC. Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches will be the second series produced in the new contract AMC has for the universe they are creating on the back of the authors numerous gothic horror novels, and will follow the Interview with the Vampire series late in 2022.

Fans of Anne Rice’s novels have been given a bit of a rollercoaster ride when it comes to the scarce adaptation of her work to screen. 1994’s Interview with the Vampire was huge hit, featuring a cast including Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Antonio Banderas and a ten year old Kirsten Dunst who was nominated for a Supporting Actress Golden Globe Award. While reviews of the movie were mixed, the next movie of Rice’s work was Queen of the Damned in 2002 and was seen as a commercial failure, recouping only $30 million of its $35 million budget from domestic ticket sales and being rejected by Rice, who said that the film “mutilated” her novel.

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Since then there have been a number of rumored plans for TV series based on the Anne Rice universe. The Feast of All Saints aired on Showtime in 2001 as a mini-series starring James Earl jones and Gloria Reuben, and at the time NBC showed an interested in producing a Mayfair Witches series but the project never got started. Universal picked up the rights to The Vampire Chronicles in 2014, but did not move ahead and the rights reverted back to Rice in 2016, and since then options have been taken on the works by Hulu and Paramount, but neither came to anything, allowing AMC to take the reins of Rice’s work.

The full statement about the project reads:

President of Entertainment and AMC Studios for AMC Networks Dan McDermott commented, “2022 will be the biggest year for original programming in the history of our company, and we are literally over the moon that it will now include the first two series in an expanding Anne Rice universe built around stories and characters that have captivated millions of fans around the world. We are also extremely fortunate to have such talented storytellers as Esta and Michelle guiding this adaptation, which will follow the first season of Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire late next year.”

“Esta Spalding (Masters of Sex, On Becoming a God in Central Florida) and Michelle Ashford (Masters of Sex, The Pacific, John Adams) are both executive producers and writers of the series. Spalding, who has an overall deal with AMC Studios, will serve as showrunner. The series will focus on an intuitive young neurosurgeon who discovers that she is the unlikely heir to a family of witches. As she grapples with her newfound powers, she must contend with a sinister presence that has haunted her family for generations."

AMC Networks last year acquired the rights to an expansive collection of Rice’s iconic works, encompassing 18 titles including The Vampire Chronicles and The Lives of the Mayfair Witches series, which have delighted fans around the world. Acclaimed and award-winning film and television producer Mark Johnson (Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, Halt and Catch Fire, Rectify), who also has an overall agreement with AMC Studios, is overseeing development of the full Anne Rice collection into a streaming and television universe, with Anne Rice and son Christopher Rice serving as executive producers on all series and films. Together, The Vampire Chronicles and The Lives of the Mayfair Witches series have sold more than 150 million copies worldwide.”

AMC’s acquisition includes the entire Vampire Chronicles series, the Lives of The Mayfair Witches series and three crossover novels, coming to a total of 18 novels to be used across their planned series providing the initial seasons can entice audiences into the dark and seductive world of Rice’s bloodsuckers and spell casters. Expect to see more as production continues. This story comes to us from Bloody Disgusting.