Two Irish Vampires Walk Into a Blood Bar; Out Come ‘Byzantium’ and ‘Boys from County Hell’
Here’s a double shot for all you bloodthirsty vampire heathens. And when I say double shot, I don’t mean a double tap to the head like Woody Harrelson’s character, Tallahassee, in “Zombieland,” would dish out.
No, I mean a shot of Irish cream and whiskey like the bartender would drop down into a glass of Guinness if she was making you an Irish Car Bomb. You can take it as a nightcap.
There are obviously many different breeds of bloodsuckers across cinema, folklore, and the cultures of the known world. But rather than throw a dart at a map or spin a globe and land my finger on a random locale, I’m going straight back to Ireland tonight, the place where Bram Stoker was born (and thus the birthplace of the Dracula legend).
It’s been a hundred and ten years since Stoker died, and most people’s knowledge of him and his life and literary work begins and ends with the novel Dracula. However, he started out as a theater critic, writing for an evening newspaper co-owned by fellow vampire author Sheridan Le Fanu, of Carmilla fame. The undead plot thickens…
From Sir Henry Irving to the Neamh-Mairbh
Some theorize that Sir Henry Irving, the most famous theater actor of his day, served as a partial inspiration for Count Dracula. He and Stoker met after Stoker wrote a positive review of his lead performance in Hamlet in Dublin.
Stoker actually wound up binding himself to Irving for over 25 years, serving as his personal assistant (a regular old Renfield, you might say) and the business manager of his London theater. It’s his home country, Ireland, though, where they have this cray-cray vampire called the Neamh-Mairbh.
Nyarlathotep vs. the Neamh-Mairbh: who would win in a fight? I realize these names might be a mouthful if you’re like me and don’t live and breathe the Cthulhu Mythos and furthermore don’t speak a word of Gaelic (having studied Spanish and celebrated Drinko de Mayo in college). But evidently, “Neamh-Mairbh” is a word that denotes the “walking dead.”
That’s not to say the Neamh-Mairbh is an Irish version of The Walking Dead, which is still somehow shambling along like a zombie of its former self after a gazillion seasons on TV. (It’s also streaming on AMC+, where you can see Boys from County Hell as well.)
No, we’re here to discuss another, smarter kind of undead or “walking dead.” Vampires!
Revenants, Neither Dead Nor Alive
Here's how the Neamh-Mairbh is referenced in the movie Byzantium, directed by Neil Jordan, the same filmmaker who helmed the one and only Interview with the Vampire:
“There was a story told when I was a boy about the Neamh-Mairbh. The revenants, neither dead nor alive. Priests use to tell it to frighten us.”
Byzantium, which went into limited release in U.S. theaters on this day in 2013, stars Gemma Arterton, who I greatly prefer to see alive and covered in blood than dead and covered in oil like she was in the James Bond film Quantum of Solace. The movie also stars Saoirse Ronan, who would earn an Oscar nomination for her role in Greta Gerwig’s coming-of-age film, Lady Bird, which might be described as a kind of Portrait of the Artist as a Young Woman, for those of you Dubliners who celebrate Bloomsday.
Byzantium shows a pair of vampire gals grappling with the patriarchy in the form of the Brethren. They’re a secret society that draws immortality from a vampire island where doppelgängers lurk in caves and blood cascades down rocks, all over sensual vampire vixens.
Johnny Lee Miller, not content to let his vamp filmography die with Dracula 2000, costars in Byzantium with Sam Riley and Caleb Landry Jones. The title refers to a hotel that becomes a vampire-run brothel, which comes across as a classier joint than other bordellos of blood.
Byzantium is scripted by Moria Buffini, based on her play, A Vampire Story. After watching it and hearing its passing mention of the Neamh-Mairbh, you may soon find yourself on a Google path to Abhartach.
Come One, Come All, to the Cairn of Abhartach
In addition to the aforementioned Carmilla and Henry Irving, the most famous of all the Neamh-Mairbh, Abhartach, could have been a more direct, homegrown inspiration for Stoker than the better-known historical figure, Vlad Tepes, a.k.a. Vlad the Impaler. Abhartach seems to have disturbing roots in the othering of people with dwarfism as black magicians who needed to be slain and buried upside-down in a vertical position.
Chris Baugh’s 2020 vampire comedy, Boys from County Hell, kept the name but ditched the problematic dwarf depiction. In the movie, Abhartach rests under a cairn, a stack of stones used as a burial or trail marker. The locals bring tourists out to his cairn, and they inhabit a town with a pub called The Stoker, for good measure.
The rules of vampirism work a little differently in Boys from County Hell. Sunlight isn’t fatal, and as the official trailer explains, “This isn’t Dracula. People don’t get turned from a f***ing bite. They get turned by the stones from Abhartach’s grave.”
Abhartach can also drain people’s blood out of their noses and eye sockets just by being in their vicinity. Jack Rowan (Peaky Blinders), Fra Free (Hawkeye), and John Lynch (Black Death) are three of the more recognizable faces in Boys from County Hell, which costars Nigel O’Neill, Louisa Harland, and Michael Hough.
That brings us full circle from Byzantium to the Boys, and it brings me to my bedtime. Good night and good luck, all you Irish-blooded vampire hunters.