25 Things You Didn’t Know About Interview With The Vampire
18. Kirsten Dunst Killed It At The Audition
Interview With The Vampire is well known as the film that made Kirsten Dunst a star. She’d just turned eleven years old when she was cast in the film, and was plucked from near obscurity after being spotted by talent scouts, beating the likes of Christina Ricci, Kat Graham, Natalie Portman, Dominique Swain, Julia Stiles, Erin Moore, and Evan Rachel Wood to the role of vampire ingenue Claudia.
Apparently she very nearly screwed the pooch at her audition, though. Reportedly the first to test for the role, she didn’t nail it the first time - but her acting coach, listening at the door outside, simply turned her around when she left and marched her straight back in, insisting that she apologise and ask to try again, claiming that “she didn’t do what she can do.”
Whatever he did, it worked - director Neil Jordan later characterised her audition as ‘extraordinary’, a description backed up by anyone who’s seen her astonishing performance in the role.