Quiz

Frank Langella also played the title character of Dracula on stage during the Broadway revival, and was nominated for a Tony Award for his performance. Langella once said of his interpretation of Dracula, "I don't play him as a hair-raising ghoul. He is a nobleman, an elegant man with a very difficult problem, a man with a unique and distinctive social problem. He has to have blood to live, and he is immortal."

Donald Pleasence was initially offered the role of the vampire hunter Professor Abraham Van Helsing, but rejected it, saying it was too similar to his role as Dr. Sam Loomis in Halloween - La notte delle streghe (1978). He accepted the different role of Dr. Jack Seward instead.

Reportedly, the concept for this movie came when Producer Walter Mirisch saw the Broadway theatrical production. Mirisch said: "I truly had no idea what to expect. But I found that (Frank) Langella had created a completely different character from the accepted sinister one, a character with charm, sex appeal, and most important of all, he endeared himself to the audiences. I decided right then to make the film!"

According to the DVD documentary The Revamping of Dracula (2004), Donald Pleasence was a props actor who knew the movie game, and frequently would be seen utilizing props like a handkerchief or eating sweets from a bag, handling objects so his scenes would be difficult to edit due to the continuity issues that exist with handling objects between shots, thereby forcing more time on-screen, and reducing the chance of his scenes being cut out of the movie.

Frank Langella suffers from an eye condition called nystagmus, which causes one's eyes to move involuntarily. The producers were aware that this might detract from the menace he was able to portray in the role, but cast him anyway, as they trusted in his overall screen presence to make the role work. In many scenes, his eyes are seen to be moving erratically, while in other scenes, he can be observed to be keeping them still, either through force of will, or by focusing on objects in the distance.