Robert Eggers has made quite the splash on the filmmaking scene for nearly a decade, first delivering The Witch to audiences in 2015, followed by The Lighthouse in 2019 and The Northman earning rave reviews earlier this year. So what’s next for the director? Well, good news for those of you who were disappointed when Eggers had to set aside his Nosferatu remake a few years back: the project is back on, and it’s found stellar replacements for Harry Styles and Anya Taylor-Joy.
Initially the plan had been for Don’t Worry Darling’s Harry Styles and Last Night in Soho’s Anya Taylor-Joy, who worked with Robert Eggers on both The Witch and The Northman, to star in the remake of the 1922 F.W. Murnau-directed horror movie starring Max Schreck as the vampiric Count Orlok. However, those plans fell through in 2019 when Nosferatu was set up at Studio 8, and Eggers decided to focus on The Northman instead. Now word’s come in that Bill Skarsgård has been cast to play Orlok, and Lily-Rose Depp is being courted to co-lead the upcoming horror movie.
Additionally, Deadline reports that the Nosferatu remake has now found a home at Focus Features, and as has always been the plan, Robert Eggers will write and direct. According to the outlet, after The Northman’s release, Eggers looked at other projects, but decided he wanted to tackle Nosferatu next. While Bill Skarsgård was reportedly “loosely attached” to play Count Orlok even in the Harry Styles and Anya Taylor-Joy days, Eggers made sure to snag Skarsgård once the remake efforts were revived before the actor’s schedule became full. As for Lily Rose-Depp, once it became clear Taylor-Joy would be too busy to do Nosferatu, Eggers met a number of actress and decided that Depp was the best choice to play the female protagonist.
Bill Skarsgård is, of course, no stranger to the horror genre. In addition to arguably being best known for playing Pennywise the Dancing Clown in the IT movies, he also took part in the short-lived Hulu series Castle Rock and most recently appeared in the bonkers and brutal Barbarian. Along with Nosferatu on his slate of upcoming projects, Skarsgård is appearing opposite Keanu Reeves in John Wick: Chapter 4 and leading The Crow reboot. 2021 was a big year for Lily-Rose Depp’s film career, as she starred in Crisis, Voyagers, Silent Night and Wolf. The actress is also one of the leads on the upcoming HBO series The Idol.
This won’t be the first time that Nosferatu is being remade, as Werner Herzog helmed his own adaptation called Nosferatu the Vampyre in 1979. That movie, though, outright named the lead vampire Count Dracula rather than Count Orlok, something the original didn’t do since it was an unauthorized adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. 2000’s Shadow of the Vampire also told a fictional account of the making of 1922’s Nosferatu, with Max Schreck, played by Willem Dafoe, being an actual vampire.
It remains to be seen when Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu will begin production, meaning it may be a while until we also learn about the actors who will join Bill Skarsgård and Lily-Rose Depp. As we wait for more updates, check out what 2023 new movie releases are officially slotted.
