AMC’s upcoming adaptation of The Vampire Lestat will adapt Anne Rice’s second novel in her Vampire Chronicles series, with Sam Reid returning as the titular vamp, now a rock star. Joining him is actress Jennifer Ehle as his mother, Gabriella, a vampire herself. In Rice’s 1985 novel, she goes by Gabrielle, but the show’s producers decided to go with the Italian pronunciation, as the character was born in Italy. The character is a fan-favorite, although some racy scenes between Mama Gabriella and her son Lestat in recent The Vampire Lestat trailers have raised some eyebrows. But this problematic relationship actually has its origins in Rice’s books, even if the Interview with the Vampire TV series may be taking things a step further. Join us as we explore the complex bond between Gabriella and Lestat, whether it’s incestual, and all the other complicated nuances of turning your mother into a vampire.
Do Lestat and His Mother Gabrielle Have an Incestuous Relationship?
In Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles novels, Lestat’s relationship with his mother is complex. And that’s putting it mildly. While many have read an incestuous vibe between the undead pair, that is not literally the truth of Gabrielle and Lestat’s relationship in the books. And that’s for the simple reason that in Rice’s vampire mythology, her undead don’t have sexual intercourse. In Rice’s world, the blood exchange replaces food as sustenance, replaces drugs as hallucinogens, and replaces sex as pleasure (and procreation). So when Lestat and Gabrielle exchange blood in Interview with the Vampire‘s world, there’s an erotic charge in the text, but it’s not sex in the literal sense.
Having said that, AMC’s Anne Rice Immortal Universe does not adhere to Rice’s rules in this way. The vampires in the series do have sex in human fashion, and are particularly horny in fact. One scene in the trailer for The Vampire Lestat shows Gabriella definitely touching her son, in an area where a mother should never touch her adult child. But this is clearly after she’s become a vampire. So does human morality even apply to them anymore? After all, is it any worse than, say, murdering people every night?
To recap, Lestat and Gabrielle have not been officially incestuous in the world of The Vampire Chronicles yet, although their relationship is blurry. But the series may be about to change all of that. Despite the lack of incest, though, Lestat and his mother plainly have always had a very complicated bond, going back to their human days.
The Mortal (and Miserable) Life of Gabrielle de Lioncourt
We are introduced to Gabrielle via the perspective of her son, Lestat. The Vampire Lestat explains how he was born Lestat de Lioncourt, the son of a country lord in the Auvergne in France. Although his father had a large and ancient estate, he’d run out of money years prior. A boorish man, he married a young girl named Gabrielle from Italy, hoping the dowry would help replenish his wealth. In The Vampire Lestat, we learn that Gabrielle was miserable in her life in the castle and hated her cruel husband. She bore him several children, only three of whom lived to adulthood. She had nothing but disdain for her eldest sons, who took after their awful father. But Gabrielle had a special place in her heart for her youngest, Lestat, who was sensitive and smart, and loved the arts.
When Lestat was 21, around the year 1780, his mother became ill with consumption. Knowing she was dying, she gave him her precious jewels and told him to sell them. She then told him to use the money to run away from home with his lover, Nicolas, and pursue his dream of acting in Paris. Although he was reluctant to leave his dying mother, it was her final wish that he escape and be happy. What Gabrielle didn’t count on was Lestat becoming a vampire while living in Paris.
How Lestat’s Mother Became a Vampire in The Vampire Lestat
When Gabrielle knew the end was near, she decided to make one last trip before she died. She went to Paris, hoping to say farewell to her son in person. Lestat was a vampire now and revealed his true nature to his mother. He had never made another vampire before, but asked her on her deathbed if she was willing to become his fledgling. Knowing she would die otherwise, Gabrielle eagerly said yes, and Lestat became the vampiric father to his human mother. Who, in a way, was now his daughter. Vampire family trees are complicated things, folks!
Gabrielle’s personality shifted almost instantly. Where Lestat only hunted evil doers (most of the time) Gabrielle killed anyone she wanted, with little moral compunction. As she saw it, as a vampire, she was higher on the food chain. She also began dressing as a man and wearing her long hair in a braid. She always felt powerless as a woman while mortal, uncomfortable in her own body, especially as the laws of the time required her to be subservient to men. And in particular, her cruel husband. Gabrielle, who insisted Lestat call her that name from now on, as “Mother” seemed inappropriate, also had little interest in the human world.
Gabrielle Becomes a Cold and Deadly Immortal
In The Vampire Lestat, Gabrielle constantly talked about hunting bears and other animals in the forest, and simply disconnecting from human life and returning to nature. Lestat, in contrast, remained very connected to humanity. He loved human art, and music, loved performing on stage for humans. He had no interest in living in a forest or jungle. When the ancient Vampire Armand blew up their lives in Paris, Lestat and Gabrielle left and wandered Europe and parts of Egypt for a decade. But even from the start of their journey, Gabrielle would vanish for weeks and months at a time. Although Gabrielle still loved Lestat, their bond was breaking. Things came to a head when Lestat learned she kept the news of their mortal family’s deaths from him, and he told her to leave him for good.
How Lestat and Gabrielle Reunite after 200 Years
Lestat would lose all contact with Gabrielle for almost two centuries. When he became a rock star in the 1980s, Gabrielle learned her sire/son was alive and well. When Lestat threw his big Halloween Night concert in 1985, the vampire community attacked the show, and Lestat and Louis had to escape. Gabrielle then pulled up in a sports car and rescued her son/father and his lover from the undead mob. Gabrielle tells Lestat that she imagined their reunion a hundred different ways over the centuries. And she never thought it would involve her saving him from a vampire gang at a rock concert.
After the events of book three, The Queen of the Damned, the surviving vampires form a coven on the luxurious Night Island, belonging to Armand, off the coast of Florida. But as she was known to do, Gabrielle quickly grew restless and wandered off into the world again. Gabrielle would pop in and out of Lestat’s life, making cameos in Rice’s subsequent novels. But she never had a book of her own, and Anne Rice said she never wanted to write one. She said Gabrielle was too cold for her to ever write from her perspective. But as of Rice’s final novel, Blood Communion, Gabrielle and Lestat were on good terms, promising never to go no-contact again.
Anne Rice’s Tragic Inspirations for the Vampire Gabrielle, Lestat’s Mother
Anne Rice went on record several times saying that her characters helped her work through her own personal tragedies. Her daughter Michelle’s death from leukemia at age 6 inspired her to create the child vampire Claudia in Interview with the Vampire. And Rice was at least partially working through the death of her mother with the creation of Lestat’s mother, Gabrielle. Rice’s mother, Katherine O’Brien, was ahead of her time, and named Anne “Howard” when she was born, not believing in gender specific naming conventions. But her mother also suffered from alcoholism and died from its complications at age 42, when Anne was only 15. Lestat saving his Gabrielle’s life and giving her a new one was Rice using writing to fictionalize saving her own unconventional mother via supernatural means.
Is the Vampire Gabrielle a Trans Character?
Fans have often cited Gabrielle as being extremely trans-coded. In The Vampire Lestat, she often lamented being forced to endure the trappings of being a woman, especially as an 18th-century woman. When she becomes a vampire, she dresses in masculine clothing and often passes as a man in a crowd. However, she never changes her pronouns, and Lestat always refers to her as “she.” But were she created today, it’s very possible Anne Rice would have written Gabrielle as a trans man. Perhaps we will see the series pick up these threads to weave a beautiful, representative story.
Gabrielle Becomes Gabriella in AMC’s The Vampire Lestat
We haven’t seen much of actress Jennifer Ehle as Gabrielle, now using the Italian pronunciation of her name, Gabriella, in The Vampire Lestat footage we’ve seen so far. We’ve seen her in the 18th-century flashbacks in period costumes, and some scenes of her at Lestat’s concerts in the modern day. Gabriella seemingly presents as female in the modern day, but looks can be deceiving. She may very well identify as a trans man post-vampirism. And we hope so.
She’s also definitely is doing something naughty with Lestat in one scene from the trailers. This suggests the producers are taking any incestuous subtext of the novel, and just making it text between mother/child Gabriella and child/father Lestat. We’ll have to wait and see how Gabriella is presented when The Vampire Lestat debuts on AMC this summer.
Interview with the Vampire seasons one and two are now streaming on AMC+.