https://www.dn.se/kultur/demian-bichir- ... en-vampyr/
The most notable takeaway from this, I think, is that Bichir wants to do "many more seasons" of the show if given the chance.
My translation of the full article:
- Swedes and Mexicans resemble each other in a lot of ways.
So says the Mexican actor Demián Bichir, at which point he briefly pauses as if to quietly contemplate what he actually means with what he just said. In what way are Mexicans and Swedes similar? Then he smiles and emphatically concludes:
- We're passionate! We don't like to just look at the surface layer of things. We like depth! So it's really not a coincidence that I'm involved in this project.
The project, which Demián Bichir has is in other words not coincidentally taken part in, is Showtime's new series Let the Right One In, a story of a vampire and her sorely tested father, loosely based on John Ajvide Lindqvist's novel Låt den rätte komma in.
Demián Bichir plays the father - who, in order to keep his daughter alive, drains seedy individuals of their blood which she then eagerly gulps up - and his statement that Mexicans and Swedes are similar is his reply to DN's question if it's a coincidence that he's tackling another project based on a Swedish predecessor after his role in the English version of The Bridge.
- In some way I have a kind of love affair with Sweden. You know, everyone admires Swedish playwrights, directors and actors and all that. I was in a Strindberg play when I was 22, we did The Ghost Sonata, and I think that's how it started for me.
To international audiences, Demián Bichir is best known for his role as Fidel Castro in Che and as a paperless gardener in A Better Life, for which he was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in 2011.
In Mexico, his family is a kind of counterpart to the Swedish Skarsgård family - his mother, father, and brothers are all famous actors. During the interview with DN, Demián Bichir repeatedly returns to the theme of "family", or rather the importance of standing up for and protecting one's family members, which he argues is what Showtime's vampire tale is about at its core.
- This is, in the end, the story of a man's love for his daughter and all the things we're prepared to do to ensure that our children are safe, happy and in this case well-fed.
Let the Right One In takes place in New York and is not so much based on John Ajvide Lindqvist's novel as much as it works as a pendant - or as Demián Bichir puts it: "a love letter" - to the Swedish film adaptation of the book. The show has some surface-level similarities to the novel but is decidedly more family-friendly. For example, the young vampire's guardian in the book is not her father but a pedophile who provides her - or really him, as the book's vampire is a castrated boy disguised as a girl - with blood in exchange for them sleeping next to each other.
- We're big fans of the film and our showrunner Andrew Hinderaker has done a fantastic job creating wonderful new characters and side plots. That was the big challenge for us to start with, transforming one and a half hours of material into eight episodes, and I hope we get asked to make many more seasons of the show, says Demián Bichir.
The role as the vampire girl, who in the series finds herself adrift with her father through a cold USA in search of a cure for her vampirism, is performed by Madison Taylor Baez. Demián Bichir says that his young co-actor impressed him during production.
- She's very professional and multitalented and made the job very easy for the rest of us.
You're a father yourself, what experiences from your own parenthood were you able to use when you tackled the role?
- The love I have for my daughter is always with me, and she was particularly present in me when we did the emotionally charged scenes. You know, everything we do in our lives, we do for our close ones, for our friends and family, so that they'll love us and be proud of us.
If your own daughter was turned into a vampire, would you do the same for her as you do for your vampire daughter in the show?
- Sometimes she reminds me of a vampire! You know how it is with kids, they're a little crazy. But of course I would. I would do everything for my daughter. Anything, says Demián Bichir.