Lestat

File:LestatCover2 4545.jpg

A musical scored by Elton John and Bernie Taupin, which had a successful run in San Francisco but closed after only a month on Broadway, Lestat is an adaptation of Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles.

The story follows Lestat de Lioncourt, a nobleman who's unappreciated by his family and makes his entrance after killing eight wolves singlehandedly. His father and brother scorn him, and he finally lets his dying mother convince him to go to Paris. Upon his arrival, he meets an old friend named Nicolas, steps out to get some air one night... and gets himself turned into a vampire.

Eventually, he reveals to his mother what he has become, and to his shock she asks him to turn her to save her from her illness. He agrees, and the two of them make their way to Paris again where they encounter the Theatre des Vampires. Lestat turns Nicolas, who refuses to drink and seal the transformation, and therefore falls ill and begins to die. So Lestat and his mother Gabrielle start off to find the one vampire who might be able to cure him, Marius. Lestat finds him, after Gabrielle has deserted him and Nicolas has died, and departs for the New World to reinvent himself. There he meets Louis and Claudia, two people who are about to teach him the meaning of the word 'unpredictable'...

As an official cast recording isn't released yet, the best place to hear the music is at the Lestat Download Center.

---

Tropes used in Lestat include:

• Adaptation Distillation: For an adaptation of two books and one Film of the Book, it's not half bad.
• Angry Mob Song: "Kill Your Own Kind"
• Badass Adorable: Claudia
• Crowd Song: "In Paris", Welcome to the New World"
• Crowning Moment of Funny: This conversation between Lestat and Gabrielle:

Gabrielle: I see it in you. You have been to the circles of Hell and back, my son. Your father and brothers couldn't understand. Lestat: How do you know? Gabrielle: I have given birth.

• Crowning Music of Awesome: The score is by Elton John. The entire show could qualify.
• Dark Reprise: "Embrace It"
• Deliberately Cute Child: Claudia
• Drowning My Sorrows: How Louis and Lestat met
• Ear Worm: "I Want More"
• Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Louis
• Elegant Gothic Lolita
• Enfant Terrible: Claudia
• Epic Instrumental Opener
• Epic Song: "From The Dead", "The Thirst"
• Establishing Character Moment: When Lestat agrees to turn his mother, when Claudia almost compulsively kills the hired help.
• Grey and Grey Morality
• Grief Song: "Sail Me Away"
• Heroic BSOD: Lestat gets one when Nicolas dies.
• Ho Yay: More between Lestat and Nicolas than the more traditional Lestat/Louis.
• "I Want" Song: Claudia gets two, "I Want More" and "I'll Never Have That Chance".
  • A darker version is "The Thirst", which is about the animalistic need for blood that Lestat discovers.
• I'm a Humanitarian
• Incest Is Relative: Subverted - Gabrielle and Lestat are indeed related, but their relationship doesn't appear to be anything unusual. She ultimately leaves when he refuses to abandon Nicolas.
• Like an Old Married Couple: Lestat and Louis. Claudia even compares them to "two fussy mothers" when they chastise her for her dining habits.
• Melismatic Vocals
• My God, What Have I Done?: Pretty traditional reaction among vampires who have just made their first kill.
• Older Than They Look
• Rage Against the Heavens: "How can this be? This devil leaves/And God abandons me..."
• Really Forty Years Old: Discussed when Claudia tells a woman at the ball her true age, and the woman takes it as a joke.
• Spoken Word in Music
• Tampering with Food and Drink
• Tears of Blood: Lestat can tell when Claudia's not really crying because she doesn't weep blood.
• The Big Easy
• Time Skip: Between Lestat's conversation with Marius and his arrival in Louisiana.
• Title-Only Chorus
• Vampire Musicals
• Victorian Novel Disease: Gabrielle
• Your Vampires Suck: The characters make fun of a book that resembles Dracula for its unrealistic depiction of vampire powers.