Bill Skarsgard worked with an opera teacher to deepen his voice for ‘Nosferatu’.
The 34-year-old actor portrays Count Orlok in director Robert Eggers’ remake of the horror classic and the filmmaker was keen for his tone to be as “deep as possible”.
Robert told SFX magazine:” That’s Bill, not effects.
“The voice that he created is very much the voice I had in my imagination. We wanted it as deep as possible, and he worked with an opera coach to deepen his voice.”
Bill and Robert also looked to Max Schreck’s portrayal of the vampire in the original 1922 ‘Nosferatu’ for inspiration on the character’s physicality.
The director explained: “We talked about having this kind of hunch that was also a bit based on Max Schreck.
“That was built into the make-up. He also wore a piece under his cloak when he didn’t have that.”
In addition, Robert sent his leading man books and film footage for further references.
He added: “I also sent him a backstory of Orlok that I wrote. So we came to it together to achieve what I was after.”
And Bill pushed for the character to show “vulnerability”, despite the director wanting to depict Orlok as out and out “evil”.
Robert said: “Because I’m so tired of the heroic and sad vampires, I was just like, ‘He’s a demon. He’s so evil.’
“But Bill was like, ‘Yeah but there needs to be some times where he has some kind of vulnerability.
“It’s very subtle, and it’s not there often, but it is enough.
“I think the ending of the movie is much more effective that it would have been without Bill’s acute sensitivity to that – while still delivering on this big, scary, masculine vampire.”
‘Nosferatu’ - which also stars Willem Dafoe, Lily-Rose Depp, Nicholas Hoult and Emma Corrin - tells the terrifying tale of a young woman who finds herself the target of the ancient Transylvanian vampire Count Orlok after the creature becomes infatuated by her.
Previously, Bill admitted he was “terrified just looking at the image” of Count Orlok, and said the idea of the vampire’s appearance was far more intimidating than that of his Pennywise the Dancing Clown costume from his two ‘It’ movies because it was so different.
And the actor was concerned he wouldn't be able to "come alive" in his performance as a result of the transformation.
Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, he said: “I was terrified just looking at the image. It looked so, so different from me, way more so than Pennywise.
“I was worried that I couldn't perform through it, that it would feel like giant prosthetic pieces, and I couldn't come alive through that.”
