Maggie Gyllenhaal returns to acting as Professor Van Helsing in Bram Stoker’s Dracula, a new full-cast audio drama. She joins Jonathan Bailey as Dracula and Ella Purnell as Mina in the English-language production, which arrived on Audible on October 1.
An acting job with a different set of demands
Gyllenhaal says this is her first acting role since The Deuce. After writing and directing her own films, she could join a production that someone else had organized. Despite earlier audiobook work on Anna Karenina and The Bell Jar, the audio drama made her feel “like a beginner.” She could not rely on the facial expressions and movement she uses on stage or screen.
This is a cast performing separate characters, rather than one narrator reading every part. Mary Lambert directs the actors, Robyn Ahern adapted the story, and Ilan Eshkeri wrote the score. Dialogue, music and sound design make up the production; the publicity photographs accompany an audio performance, not a new film.
Van Helsing joins Mina’s search for answers
Gyllenhaal’s Professor Van Helsing is the scholar called in by Dr. Seward to confront the threat posed by Dracula. Van Helsing’s knowledge makes the character part of the group trying to understand a danger that cannot be explained through ordinary medicine.
Mina is central to this adaptation. When her fiancé disappears in Transylvania, she pieces together letters, diary entries and testimony to find out what has happened. Purnell plays her opposite Bailey’s Count Dracula, a predator who is also pursuing the people Mina wants to protect.
The actors behind the English-language cast
Bailey’s earlier work includes Bridgerton, Fellow Travelers and Wicked. Here, he plays the vampire rather than one of the romantic leads that made him widely known. Purnell’s credits include Lucy in Fallout and Jackie in Yellowjackets, alongside voice work in Arcane and Star Trek: Prodigy.
Aimee Lou Wood plays Lucy Westenra, Mina’s friend. Wood previously played Aimee in Sex Education and Chelsea in the third season of The White Lotus. Her Lucy in Dracula is a different character from Purnell’s Lucy in Fallout.
Louis Partridge voices Mina’s fiancé, Jonathan Harker, while David Jonsson plays Dr. Seward. Johnny Flynn plays Renfield, and Lesley Manville plays Lucy’s mother, Mrs. Westenra. Partridge is also known for the Enola Holmes films; Jonsson’s earlier work includes Industry, and Flynn played Mr. Knightley in Emma.
The Dracula audio-drama cast in official portraits
3 screenshotsMary Lambert directs her first audiobook
Lambert directed the 1989 film adaptation of Pet Sematary. Dracula marks her audiobook-directing debut, bringing a filmmaker with horror experience to the recording. Ahern’s adaptation is her first lead writing credit; she previously received the Bisha K. Ali Screenwriters Fellowship.
Eshkeri’s earlier work includes the Audible production of 1984 and House of Guinness. His original music accompanies the Dracula cast and its sound effects. The English-language edition is also available in Dolby Atmos, the audio format that can place sounds around the listener.
Gyllenhaal’s recent work behind the camera
Gyllenhaal made her feature-directing debut with The Lost Daughter, adapting Elena Ferrante’s novel. Olivia Colman and Jessie Buckley play older and younger versions of Leda. Colman recommended Buckley for the younger role during a lunch with Gyllenhaal, who later encouraged the two actors to make their performances distinct rather than copy each other.
She also wrote and directed the 22-minute short Flesh Impact, presented in Venice in September. Dakota Johnson plays Marilyn Monroe at the height of her fame, while Ellen Burstyn plays an imagined older version. Peter Sarsgaard and Sepideh Moafi also appear. Read more about Burstyn and the Flesh Impact cast.
The English production is available now
The English-language Dracula audio drama is available on Audible now. French, Italian, Castilian Spanish and Latin American Spanish productions also launched on October 1. Each language version has its own cast; Bailey, Purnell and Gyllenhaal are part of the English ensemble.
The German production is scheduled for February 9, 2027. Brazilian Portuguese is planned for 2027, without a specific date or cast announced. Those later releases are separate from the English production already available to listeners.
