Based on the hugely popular books, The Vampire Diaries has been a smash hit in the US. Based around a high school girl, falling in love with a vampire and his battle with not only himself, but his evil brother.
Sounds a little familiar doesn’t it?
As the show’s jetting it’s way over the Atlantic to us next year, FemaleFirst talked to Nina Dobrev and Paul Wesley, who star as Elena and Stefan, the shows lovers, it’s Edward and Bella if you will, about the show and them as actors.
FemaleFirst: Congratulations on the show being brought over here, why do you think it’s been such a hit in America?
Paul: We I think if people just tuned in because of the whole vampire trend, and people stuck with it and it grew with
word of mouth because the writers and everyone else just kind of magically fitted together, it was great.
Nina: Everyone is really great at what they do individually so together we really put our all into making this great show and we’re all very proud of it I think.
P: most importantly it’s gotten better and better and people are recognising that, and it’s my opinion that the show has got progressively better.
N: And we can’t wait for all of you guys to see it!
FF: Why do think vampires are so popular right now?
P: We get asked that all time and I always say it’s because of the beautiful, amazing dichotomy in the vampire paradox.
That protective, nurturing, endless love that they have and the passion for, like with my character for Elena, but is also infused with this desire to suck on her neck and feed on her and kill her because it’s in my nature so I think people are fascinated by that.
N: Vampires are timeless, just like the genre they’ve been always been around. Right now this craze is booming but before Twilight and Tue Blood there was Interview with A Vampire and Dracula and all these other movies. So they’ve always been around and they have this mysterious appeal.
P: They’ve become modernised in a very attractive, sexual way and I think people also respond to that.
FF: The show is of course based off the books by L. J. Smith, so have either of you read them?
P: Yeah, we’ve read them even though the books are a foundation for the show and the show’s taken creative licence to deviate for appropriate reasons and for good reasons in order to serialise it.
So we can’t marry ourselves too much to the books, but for me, I pay respect to the character that was originally conceived and try to show that on the screen but I let the writers take me the way they want to go.
N: I agree and although I think my character changes the most from the books to the series, for a few reasons. Purely aesthetically, I’m not blonde haired, blue eyed like Elena is described in the novel.
P: She’s a lot more likeable in the series.
N: I think so. In the books she’s sort of queen bee, high school popular girl that gets what she wants when she wants it and our Elena’s more like a real, relatable, down to Earth girl who’s dealing with a lot of things and a lot of issues.
Her boyfriend's a vampire and could possibly kill her at any possible moment, her brother’s a drug addict, she’s living with her aunt who’s not much older than she is and her parents passed away, so she’s a lot different.
FF: A lot of American shows take breaks in filming, so do you have time to fit in movies or other projects?
N: I think I speak for both of us when I say that we’re both reading a lot of scripts right now for films, but it’s all about finding the right project that we’re passionate about to do in our break.
P: Finding the right one is the main thing
. Nina, Ian and myself we all, first and foremost love what we do so finding the right roles that make us more excited than the roles on Vampire Diaries.
N: I would rather not do something and take the time off than do something that I’m not completely invested in.
P: For me, I wouldn’t want to take a break from Stefan for more than a couple of months because I love the show so much but it would be cool do something else.
FF: So, Paul, do you find it hard to play a vampire as they’re such conflicted characters?
P: It’s certainly challenging to make any character complex and interesting but when I read the script, I sort of fell into Stefan and related to him and I have no idea why.
I could sit here and psychologically analyse myself, and I probably have and come with reasons why I relate to him but in an abridged version I think there are a lot of similarities between Stefan and myself.
So, there’s difficulty in that, but what we do is difficult and that’s why I do it, I need challenge in what I’m doing.
FF: Nina, you’ve acted in both this and a television film called Never Cry Werewolf, so do you like playing supernatural parts?
N: I love the show and I love that it has all these supernatural abilities and the vampires and the witches and the effects and it’s really cool and it’s really fun to do and I do like it.
Never Cry Werewolf was a film that I did years ago for the Sci-Fi network and it was a lot of fun too, it’s all about enjoying what you do at the time you’re doing it. I don’t want to just play that [fantasy characters] though.
I love it, but I would love to be in a sports movie, I’d love to do an action film and a drama and a comedy, there are so many different things I want to do.
I’d rather not do something in the same gene during my time off because I’m dying to a drama or a teary piece just to spice things up have a fresh challenge.
FF: How has the huge success of this show affected your personal lives?
N: Well, for one thing we now live in Atlanta, Georgia.
P: The fact that we’re in Atlanta, we’re a little bit removed from everything, so we’re pretty oblivious really.
N: It gives us a chance to have a personal life.
P: Los Angeles, New York, London these are very metropolitan, big cities and I think it’s a little more apparent there when you’re on a TV show and you live there. For us in Atlanta it’s pretty normal.
N: We all really enjoy that, we like to just go to work, do our thing, come home, watch movies, hang out, it’s cool.
FF: The show’s been getting great viewing figures in the States, so are you confident of getting a second season?
N: We feel good about it, but until we get the official letter in the mail saying ‘will you come back to Atlanta in July to start filming again’ we can’t say anything but we feel really good because we think this show is awesome and the feedback we’ve been getting has been great and it’s been a hit.
Even here, where the show hasn’t even aired yet, we’ve had people tell us they’ve watched it and they like it so it’s gonna be good here too.
P: Can’t imagine the British would be that much different from Americans, come on.
The Vampire Diaries is coming to ITV2 early next year and the first episode is available to buy now on iTunes.
FemaleFirst Cameron Smith
Based on the hugely popular books, The Vampire Diaries has been a smash hit in the US. Based around a high school girl, falling in love with a vampire and his battle with not only himself, but his evil brother.
Sounds a little familiar doesn’t it?
As the show’s jetting it’s way over the Atlantic to us next year, FemaleFirst talked to Nina Dobrev and Paul Wesley, who star as Elena and Stefan, the shows lovers, it’s Edward and Bella if you will, about the show and them as actors.
FemaleFirst: Congratulations on the show being brought over here, why do you think it’s been such a hit in America?
Paul: We I think if people just tuned in because of the whole vampire trend, and people stuck with it and it grew with word of mouth because the writers and everyone else just kind of magically fitted together, it was great.
Nina: Everyone is really great at what they do individually so together we really put our all into making this great show and we’re all very proud of it I think.
P: most importantly it’s gotten better and better and people are recognising that, and it’s my opinion that the show has got progressively better.
N: And we can’t wait for all of you guys to see it!
FF: Why do think vampires are so popular right now?
P: We get asked that all time and I always say it’s because of the beautiful, amazing dichotomy in the vampire paradox.
That protective, nurturing, endless love that they have and the passion for, like with my character for Elena, but is also infused with this desire to suck on her neck and feed on her and kill her because it’s in my nature so I think people are fascinated by that.
N: Vampires are timeless, just like the genre they’ve been always been around. Right now this craze is booming but before Twilight and Tue Blood there was Interview with A Vampire and Dracula and all these other movies. So they’ve always been around and they have this mysterious appeal.
P: They’ve become modernised in a very attractive, sexual way and I think people also respond to that.
FF: The show is of course based off the books by L. J. Smith, so have either of you read them?
P: Yeah, we’ve read them even though the books are a foundation for the show and the show’s taken creative licence to deviate for appropriate reasons and for good reasons in order to serialise it.
So we can’t marry ourselves too much to the books, but for me, I pay respect to the character that was originally conceived and try to show that on the screen but I let the writers take me the way they want to go.
N: I agree and although I think my character changes the most from the books to the series, for a few reasons. Purely aesthetically, I’m not blonde haired, blue eyed like Elena is described in the novel.
P: She’s a lot more likeable in the series.
N: I think so. In the books she’s sort of queen bee, high school popular girl that gets what she wants when she wants it and our Elena’s more like a real, relatable, down to Earth girl who’s dealing with a lot of things and a lot of issues.
Her boyfriend's a vampire and could possibly kill her at any possible moment, her brother’s a drug addict, she’s living with her aunt who’s not much older than she is and her parents passed away, so she’s a lot different.
FF: A lot of American shows take breaks in filming, so do you have time to fit in movies or other projects?
N: I think I speak for both of us when I say that we’re both reading a lot of scripts right now for films, but it’s all about finding the right project that we’re passionate about to do in our break.
P: Finding the right one is the main thing. Nina, Ian and myself we all, first and foremost love what we do so finding the right roles that make us more excited than the roles on Vampire Diaries.
N: I would rather not do something and take the time off than do something that I’m not completely invested in.
P: For me, I wouldn’t want to take a break from Stefan for more than a couple of months because I love the show so much but it would be cool do something else.
Tagged in The Vampire Diaries Paul Wesley