DRAC’S back, but not where you might think. You most likely associate Count Dracula with the ruins at windswept Whitby here in the UK, or perhaps sitting in a terrifying Transylvanian castle.

But there are big centenary celebrations to get your teeth into in … Derby. Because it was the Midlands city that hosted the world premiere of the play Dracula on May 15, 1924, before it moved to the West End.

Raymond Huntley and Mary Patrick in the 1924 play

From there, the production crossed the pond to Broadway, where one Bela Lugosi made the part his own, and Hollywood sat up and took notice, eventually ushering in the Hammer Horror era of bloodsucker Christopher Lee.

Max Shreck had starred in the silently sinister Nosferatu a couple of years earlier, but Derby’s theatrical adaptation of Bram Stoker’s iconic novel was the very first time that the world had seen Count Dracula onstage.

The Grand Theatre, which once stood on Babington Lane, staged the world premiere of Hamilton Deane’s adaptation of Dracula, starring Raymond Huntley, in 1924, and it was this production that first gave the vampire his trademark look.

Dr Matthew Cheeseman, Associate Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Derby, explains: “While Whitby has long been associated with the Dracula of Bram Stoker’s novel, Derby is the birthplace of the character’s journey from monster to international cultural superstar.

Christopher Lee as Dracula

“When the curtain went up, the Derby Dracula was suave and charming, wearing evening dress and an opera cloak. This is the character that was adapted by Hollywood and took over the world.”

When the play opened its three-night run, Stoker’s widow, Florence, was in the audience. The production went on to enjoy a successful tour in England, and eventually reached the West End in 1927.

Bela Lugosi as the Count

A revised version of the play – starring Bela Lugosi in his first major English-speaking role – was staged on New York’s Broadway later that year. It returned to the UK again in 1951, in the hope of once again making it to the West End.

Producers had persuaded Lugosi to reprise the role, and the production reached Derby’s Hippodrome on September 17 – but Lugosi, by now 68, exhausted, and in low spirits, quit during the run, and the tour ended the following month.

The Grand Theatre, where it all began

The University of Derby has been awarded £100,000 by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, part of UK Research and Innovation, for 14 months of events and activities in partnership with Derby Museums, Sheffield Hallam University and Bournemouth University.

Events and workshops will be taking place across the city throughout this year and into 2025, with plenty of opportunities for the public to be involved and shape the way Dracula’s connections with the city are promoted.

Dacre Stoker

Among the first will be two talks hosted by Derby Museums, on May 23 and 24 May by Dacre Stoker, great grandnephew of Bram Stoker, on the influences and legacy of the novel. 

Dr Cheeseman will also be delivering a May 30 talk during Derby Book Festival, exploring how the charming ‘Derby Dracula’ conquered the world. For details of initial events see the centenary celebrations site. For info on Derby, head to VisitDerby.