St. Pete’s Eugenie Bondurant is back onscreen this week
As the Halloween season begins to loom on the horizon like an inevitable blood moon, Eugenie Bondurant is doing her part by keeping company with vampires and werewolves.
Bondurant, the St. Petersburg-based actress and fashion model, caught the attention of horror fans with her turn as a mysterious, sinister character in last year’s The Conjuring 3: The Devil Made Me Do It.
Bondurant i “Interview With the Vampire,” episode 1. Photo: AMC.
Bondurant has a small role in the first episode of AMC’s stylish new series Interview With the Vampire, based on the Ann Rice books. From the producers of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, the copiously bloody series – centered about the handsome vampires Lestat de Lioncourt and Louis de Pointe du Lac – premiered Sunday night.
Still, the striking, 6-foot-one performer points out, “I don’t scare people in Interview with the Vampire – I play the madame at an upscale brothel in 1910. To me, that’s relatively normal … whatever that means.”
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Vampire was shot in December, on location in New Orleans, Bondurant’s hometown. As such, she made numerous recommendations to her fellow cast members about restaurants, museums and the like.
In addition to being a homecoming for her, she says, “It’s really an experience, being in New Orleans. We got to shoot in a beautiful location at night. And the wardrobe, everything was gorgeous.
“That show is so beautifully shot. And the two leads suit their roles so well.”
Three months later, Bondurant was in Atlanta, working on the Marvel Comics-produced Werewolf By Night, which will premiere Oct. 7 on Disney+. The story’s origins are in classic Marvel comic books.
Director Michael Giacchino shot the 53-minute film in black and white as an homage to classic monster movies. IndieWire reviewed it thusly: “Utilizing elements of dark comedy, light romance, and friendship, Werewolf by Night is successfully able to balance fun and fright.”
Bondurant’s character is a member of a secret group of “monster hunters” summoned to aid the widow of one of their own, one Ulysses Bloodstone. A creature is on the loose on the grounds of Bloodstone’s castle, and it has a relic that the widow – and the corpse – want back (remember, it’s Halloween fare).
Since it has yet to premiere, Bondurant is contractually forbidden from saying too much about Werewolf By Night.
Still the actress, who also teaches the craft at Greenlight Cinema in St. Pete, agrees that a line from the dark, moody Conjuring can be drawn to her participation in the dark, moody Werewolf.
At the 2022 Balenciaga Haute Couture Show in Paris. Photo provided.
“I think Conjuring helped,” Bondurant reports. “Casting’s a situation I’m always trying to wrap my mind around. I don’t know! I’m sure glad it happened, whatever it was.”
Still very much a going concern is Bondurant’s association with fashion designer Denma Gvasalia at the House of Balenciaga, for whom she periodically travels to Paris to model on the most prestigious fashion runways.
Noted fashionista Kanye West was among those walking the walk in Balenciaga’s Mud Show Oct. 2. Eugenie Bondurant, however, was busy here at home.
“Honestly, I’m glad I wasn’t asked to be in it,” she says, “because I would have been leaving on Monday or Tuesday. And panicked that a storm was heading here. I wouldn’t have wanted to get on a plane. Even if I could have.”
