Bela Lugosi as Dracula

Classic Movie Monsters
Bela Lugosi 1882-1956 in Dracula (1931)

The Hungarian matinee idol Bela Lugosi achieved cinematic immortality as the world's most famous vampire
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Dracula (1931)

Dracula
(Shown are Bela Lugosi and Helen Chandler)

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Dracula is a 1931 vampire-horror film directed by Tod Browning and starring Bela Lugosi as the title character.

Today, Dracula is widely regarded as a classic of the era and of its genre. In 2000, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

To many film lovers and critics alike, Lugosi's portrayal is widely regarded as the definitive Dracula. Lugosi had a powerful presence and authority on-screen. The slow, deliberate pacing of his performance ("I bid you… welcome!" and "I never drink… wine!") gave his Dracula the air of a walking, talking corpse, which terrified 1931 movie audiences. He was just as compelling with no dialogue, and the many close-ups of Lugosi's face in icy silence jumped off the screen. With this mesmerizing performance, Dracula became Bela Lugosi's signature role, his Dracula a cultural icon, and he himself a legend in the classic Universal Horror film series.

However, Dracula would ultimately become a role which would prove to be both a blessing and a curse. Despite his earlier stage successes in a variety of roles, from the moment Lugosi donned the cape on screen, it would forever see him typecast as the Count.