The Mammoth Book Of Vampire Stories Written By Women

One particular scene took a lot of work to get "in the can". I was supposed to bite Kate O'Mara. Kate is usually in control, but once she goes — she goes. Although my fangs had been specially fitted by a dentist, they did not fit as well as they might have. I had this big struggle with Kate, and my incisors decided to desert my mouth for the more enticing depths of Kate's cleavage. Of course, all the men on set gallantly jumped forward to retrieve them! Kate started to go. I was too concerned with my wayward teeth to be affected at first.

We tried the scene again. My teeth headed for Kate's cleavage like a rabbit down a hole. Kate corpsed. Everybody tried to keep their cool. Kate managed to simmer down. And, would you believe it, those rotten teeth headed for their new home yet again. This time Kate freaked out with everybody else on the set.

All I got was mad. I noticed one of the grips chewing gum. I called him over, took his gum, and jammed the fangs back into my mouth using the gum as a suction pad. Success. But Kate and the rest of the crew were hooting away even more frenetically by then. That finished work for the day. By that time, even I was rolling around in fits of hysteria.

The next day I made sure that my teeth were secure. And everybody made sure that they did not make eye contact with anyone else. That way led to disaster.

Overall, though, it was a wonderful introduction to the world of the vampire and Gothic overkill.

As we were finishing The Vampire Lovers , I heard that Hammer was setting up another film, called Countess Dracula . It was going to be a big, lavish production and the lead character seemed to be right up my street: a sixteenth-century serial killer called Countess Erzsebet Bathory.

I had also heard that Diana Rigg was up for the part. I could not have that, so I cornered Jimmy Carreras and made him promise to give me a chance.

There were also a couple of other vampire films in the early stages of development at Hammer: Lust for a Vampire and Twins of Evil . I read the first draft scripts. The Carmilla character had another outing, but the part was a tag-on rather than the central role, and that made me even more determined to get the part of Erzsebet Bathory.

I do not know what happened, but one day Jimmy called me into his office and told me that I was to play Bathory.

Unfortunately, Countess Dracula was not quite the happiness factory that The Vampire Lovers had been. For one thing, the management had come to the conclusion that Hammer was in a battle for survival that it would be hard to win. To try and counter this, they had bought up the sets and many of the costumes from the historical film Anne of the Thousand Days . This was to give the production an unaccustomed gloss.

The director, Peter Sasdy, was not at all happy with the title. It was exploitative, and he was not making a vampire film. He wanted a title with more resonance. This caused big arguments on set with the producer, Alexander Paal.

However, there were still the odd moments of light relief. When Sandor Eles, my co-star, was building up to have his wicked way with me in the hay, I looked at his face and shouted, " Cut !" This did not go down well with the frazzle-nerved Sasdy, and he shouted at me that he was the one who said when to say "cut". I did not care, because I was having a fit of the giggles. I pointed to Sandor's face. Half of his false moustache was missing.

A thorough search was made, but it seems that it is as hard to find half a moustache in a haystack as a needle. I went off to my dressing-room and levered myself out of the heavy skirt I was wearing. Then in the mirror I noticed something obscene crawling out of my navel. I gave a high-pitched scream, whacked at it with my corset, and leaped on to the bunk.

My dresser came running. I explained that I had been invested with something Satanic and pointed hysterically to where I had seen the alien item disappear. She bent down and held the hairy object up to the light. It was the missing half of Sandor's moustache!

The Vampire Lovers and Countess Dracula have since become classics of the genre, and I am glad that I braved that cold December morning to meet with Jimmy Carreras.

I did one more outing as a vampire. This was in the Amicus film The House That Dripped Blood with Jon Pertwee. Originally it was going to be a straight horror film, but Jon just worked on director Peter Duffell until he rejigged the script (by horror writer Robert Bloch) and made it into a comedy. I think the film benefited from it.