Dracula's Daughter - Production

Production

Universal originally did not hold the rights to "Dracula's Guest", a chapter excised from Bram Stoker's original novel and the purported source material for the film. The story includes an encounter between a man (presumed by some to be Jonathan Harker although the character is not identified as such) and a female vampire. The story does not establish a filial relationship between the female vampire and Dracula. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer executive David O. Selznick negotiated a contract in 1933 with Stoker's widow, Florence, to buy the rights to the chapter for an advance of $500 against a purchase price of $5,000. MGM's lawyers and executives were worried about the use of the word "Dracula" in the film's title, fearing that Universal would take legal action, although Selzick's contract with Stoker explicitly listed "Dracula's Daughter" as a possible alternate title. The project was code-named "Tarantula" in correspondence.

Selznick hired John L. Balderston, who had previously worked on the 1931 Dracula and Frankenstein, to write the screenplay. Balderston's screenplay involved tying up loose ends from the original film. In it, Von Helsing returns to Transylvania to destroy the three vampire brides seen in Dracula but overlooks a fourth tomb concealing Dracula's daughter. She follows him back to London and operates under the name "Countess Szekelsky". She attacks a young aristocrat and Von Helsing and the aristocrat's fiancée track her back to Transylvania and destroy her. The script included scenes that implied that Dracula's daughter enjoyed torturing her male victims and that while under her control the men liked it too. Also included were shots of the Countess's chambers being stocked with whips and straps, which she would never use on-screen but whose uses the audience could imagine. Regardless of any objections that the Production Code Administration (PCA) would have raised to many aspects of the scenario, Balderston's script could never have been filmed because Selznick's contract with Stoker expressly barred him from using any Bram Stoker characters that did not appear in "Dracula's Guest". Selznick re-sold the rights to "Dracula's Guest" to Universal in September 1935 for $12,500, which included the rights to Balderston's scenario. Horror film scholar David J. Skal theorizes that this was Selznick's actual motivation in buying the rights in the first place, to profit from Universal's desire for a sequel by tying up the only obvious source material.