Christopher Buehlman's chilling supernatural novel The Lesser Dead is getting new life as a dramatic podcast. The story centers on an eternally-young 19-year-old vampire whose cushy existence in 1970s New York comes under threat by a dangerous new breed of bloodsuckers looking to stake their claim to the underground colony of creatures.
Jack Kilmer leads the ensemble cast of The Lesser Dead as protagonist Joey Peacock alongside Minnie Driver, Danny Huston, and Saul Rubinek. Blending a dark sense of humor with the gritty world of its era, Buehlman's novel is brought to life in an exhilarating fashion.
In anticipation of its premiere, Screen Rant spoke exclusively with star Minnie Driver to discuss The Lesser Dead, making her dramatic podcast debut, working alongside Jack Kilmer, and her potential Witcher franchise future.
Minnie Driver on The Lesser Dead & The Witcher Future
Screen Rant: I am very excited to talk about The Lesser Dead, it has quite a unique supernatural twist. What about it really sparked your interest?
Minnie Driver: It's a great story, it's a really great story. I was interested in exploring the discipline of a dramatic podcast, because it's always interesting to do something that you've never done before, but mostly it was a great story. It's something that I know would be entertaining, which is largely, like, when you're making stuff that you're putting out into the world, you want to make sure that you think, "Oh, this is something that I would listen to and enjoy." So, I think it's really cool, I think people will really enjoy it, and that's part of me doing a good job, I think.
Were you familiar with Christopher Buehlman's novel prior to getting the script for this?
Minnie Driver: No, when I read the scripts, that was the first time, which is actually great, because you can then really be hit with the story. Everything was new, sort of reading the format of a scripted podcast, or a dramatic podcast, is very different to a movie script, so it was really cool, he's a great writer.
He's very good with imagery in his writing, and I especially love your character, Margaret. She's so interesting, to say the least, as it goes on.
Minnie Driver: It's great to visualize her, as well as to listen to her. I think she's really weird.
I was going to say, you're no stranger to voiceover work, whether it be Tarzan or even more recently with your own podcast, but what is it like getting to the heart of a character who primarily only exists on the page rather than a full, in-life person?
Minnie Driver: Well, it's no different to creating a character for movies or for a TV show, it's the same process. There are certain things that you need to do technically, I suppose, when you're conveying something just with your voice, and people can't take the cues from the way that you look. So, that's always interesting. You're taking away that someone can cut away to you when you're not saying anything, and an audience can understand what's happening in a look, with like a cutaway close-up in a movie, but here you don't have that.
You're conveying everything as you're speaking, which you think can make you hit everything a bit too hard. But, it's funny, you become more economical, I think, and very, very specific with how you say things. It's a good discipline, I feel like every actor should do it, because it stops you relying on a camera to tell a story for you, you really are telling the story, you really are in control of of what people's experience is, so I really liked it.
What would you then say was one of the biggest keys for you in finding Margaret's voice for all of those directions that you just kind of discussed?
Minnie Driver: It's really just doing it and seeing what works, you're not burning any film or whatever the digital equivalent is, you're not burning any time. You can find it and see what works. It's interesting having a director who does that, like Dan Blank, he knew it's a different thing when you're being an auditory director, because you're sort of listening for where the balance is, as opposed to looking for what the image looks like. So it wasn't hard, it was just a different discipline, a different exploration. At This point, I've done pretty much every kind of version of interaction with media entertainment, and it's so cool doing something for the first time. I really enjoyed it.
I loved hearing the evolution of Margaret's voice throughout the story between the flashbacks to the present day. What is that like for you as a performer practicing that for yourself in the takes as well as outside of the booth, especially with an Irish accent?
Minnie Driver: In my opinion, you really shouldn't be doing an accent at all unless you've made it completely integral to that character. When accents are just laid upon something because, "Oh, it will be fun to do that," or "This is a great idea," and it's terrible, and it takes you out of the drama, it's just one of my least favorite things in the world. You have to integrate it into the character when you're creating it and thinking about it. So you're thinking about that character with that voice, and then with the flashbacks, it's just about sort of being quick and disciplining going, "Okay, here we are, this is before all of this stuff had happened, so all of this sadness and awfulness in her own life hasn't happened, how is that reflected in her voice?"
There's a lack of tension and lack of stress, they're working as a housekeeper. It's interesting, it's cool, you're like, "Well, how is that reflected?" It requires a lot of thought, but, again, I've been doing this for such a long time, not much surprises me. I think maybe I can become a bit lazy going, "Okay, well I know how to do this, I'll just do that. This is what they expect, this is what they want, this will work." But actually to go and really have to work on fine tuning and creating something without having the way that you look help you, that's a good discipline. That's why I think every actor should do it, it's hard, you could be a giant ball really quickly, like you better figure it out. I liked figuring out the way that she sounded, which is obviously the accent was a huge part of that.
I'm a fan of your work, but off the top of my head, I cannot remember if you've ever done an Irish accent.
Minnie Driver: I was Irish in Circle of Friends, which you're too young to remember that film, that came out in '94, I think, or '95, and then more recently, I did the wonderful anthology show, Modern Love, for Amazon, and I was Irish in the episode that I did for them. The thing is, I've spent a lot of time in my life in Ireland, lots of my family are Irish, it's a place that I feel very comfortable researching and being in, I have a lot of love for Ireland.
From everything I've heard, it's a very beautiful country. Often with voiceover work, especially nowadays, actors don't get to interact with one another during recordings. Did you get to have any recording sessions or interactions with your co-stars on this?
Minnie Driver: I was actually in studio with Jack, which was great, so we hung out. I didn't get to see Danny, Danny's an old friend of mine, but we didn't get to actually [see each other], it was just to do with his shooting schedule and mine, we never actually got to be in the same place. But yeah, Jack was the only other cast member — I mean, there was some other voice actors that I would see they were in a booth and we would interact a little bit, but Jack was my main foil and Danny, but it was always just over a line.
What was it then like getting to actually interact with Jack in person and learn about each other, as well as discuss the characters with one another?
Minnie Driver: It was great, it's part of that great process of meeting people that you've never met before and creating something together, and Jack's smart and young. He's really figuring out what he was doing, it was great.
What is one of the biggest things that you are really looking forward to listeners really getting to dive into for this series?
Minnie Driver: I think people who know me and know my work, this is a very, very, very different character for me. I've never done anything like this in my career, so I'm very excited for people to hear me as an eternal savage vampire who's the matriarch of a big community and is actually a good person, if a dark person. [Chuckles] I think that's really cool.
I think this world is so cinematic. 1970s New York, vampires living beneath the subways, it's pretty cool, I think I'm really excited for people to enter that world because we just haven't seen that. We've seen vampires, we know 1970s New York, but we've never seen the confluence of them. It's as dark as it gets, if that's also what you're into, it's a really smart twist on the supernatural horror genre, because it's really clever, and awful. [Laughs]
I loved getting to see you be a part of The Witcher universe with Blood Origin. I know that Lauren Hissrich has mentioned possibly bringing you back in the future, but I'm curious if you have heard any further talks about that, or if you're hoping to come back for more?
Minnie Driver: Yeah, it was so cool creating that character. Tthey're very smart to create a character who can move through dimensions and time, so they could use her, like, I think it would be great, I would love to. I haven't heard anything subsequently, but I feel like that's something that could happen at any time, that if the writers go, "Oh, we need a character, we need Seanchai to come in and connect these things," it would be great. It's always fun being part of a fantastic universe with a huge fan base, it's a cracking show, so yeah, I'd love to do that, we'll see if that happens.
About The Lesser Dead
The supernatural audio series stars Academy Award nominee Minnie Driver (Good Will Hunting and The Riches), Jack Kilmer (The Nice Guys, Palo Alto), Danny Huston (X-Men Origins: Wolverine) and Saul Rubinek (Hunters, Warehouse 13). The Lesser Dead will be available at launch on Wondery+.
Award-winning author Christopher Buehlman (The Blacktongue Thief, Those Across The River, Between Two Fires) adapted his darkly-comedic novel of the same title to audio. Set in wild-and-wooly 1978 New York City, The Lesser Dead embeds you in a colony of vampires led by the formidable Margaret McMannis (Driver) and is narrated by one of her clan members, Joey Peacock (Kilmer), an irreverent, eternally-young 19-year-old who quite literally never grew up. When a dangerous new adversary enters their world, Margaret and Joey’s unconventional family of vampires must come together before it’s too late.
The Lesser Dead is now streaming on Wondery+.