Tim Burton has revealed that he was inspired to make Dark Shadows because he feels like an outsider.
The director’s new movie is a remake of the cult 1960s gothic soap opera, which saw the vampire Barnabas Collins wake from a 200-year slumber and reconnect with his family. Johnny Depp plays the character in the film.
But in a new interview which you can watch above, Burton reveals that he identified with the out-of-time bloodsucker from an early age. He says: “Back in the late ’60s early ’70s, this weird gothic soap opera was on every day, and it was just such a weird event, there was nothing like it on television at the time, or before, or since.
“The thing that freaked me about it was that I had that feeling, I still have that feeling like you don’t fit into your environment and society or whatever. That for me [made it] easy to identify with the Barnabas character and just the kind of nature of feeling like you don’t fit into the world.”
The director explained of the film’s quirky style: “To me I like things that are a mixture of things. When something is sad, often-times it’s funny, or vice versa, it’s light, dark, life is comprised of all those things at once, so for me I hope [people] can go with the tonal shifts.”
He goes on to praise his cast, which includes Michelle Pfieffer, Chloe Moretz and Jonny Lee Miller: “I felt blessed with the cast as well. For me, they’re Dark Shadows [people]. I would drive the casting director nuts, ‘that person, they’re not very Dark Shadows, but I was so lucky to get what I consider [to be] Dark Shadows people. Because when you’re making a film, it is like a weird family and so you kind of like to have that wonderfully dysfunctional family.”
Dark Shadows is on general release in the UK now.