‘Interview With the Vampire’: Meet the Real Armand With Assad Zaman (VIDEO)

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Assad Zaman found out halfway through his Interview With the Vampire audition process that he wasn’t just vying for the role of Rashid. Unbeknownst to the actor, 33, series creator and showrunner Rolin Jones had big plans for his presence in what would become the hit TV adaptation of Anne Rice‘s most famous novel.

The Season 1 finale revealed the truth behind the curtain: Rashid wasn’t assistant to Louis de Pointe du Lac (Jacob Anderson) — he was the 514-year-old vampire Armand, equipped with the flying “cloud gift” that Lestat de Lioncourt (Sam Reid) concealed from Louis for so long. Viewers will meet the real Armand (and the “Real Rashid,” played by Bally Gill) in Interview With the Vampire Season 2, premiering Sunday, May 12 on AMC and AMC+. We know fans are dying to see this character fully fleshed out, so what do we know about Armand already?

For starters, we know he’s of vital importance to Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles 13-book series (he and Daniel Molloy are the main subject of the “Devil’s Minion” chapter in Book 3, Queen of the Damned, and Book Six, The Vampire Armand, is entirely dedicated to him). Interview With the Vampire Season 2 covers the second half of the eponymous novel, the first of the franchise, and Armand is more present than Lestat in this part of the bloody tale. We know that Armand knew Lestat before Louis thanks to the Théâtres des Vampires, which Armand directs in 1940s Paris. We also know that Armand is the love of Louis’ life, as said in the final line of Season 1. And most importantly, we know that Armand was there when Louis first met Daniel Molloy (Eric Bogosian) on that fateful night in San Francisco in 1973.

Here, Zaman tells TV Insider what we don’t know. And in the video interview below, the actor answers fans’ burning questions sent to us ahead of the Television Critics Association Winter 2024 Press Tour in February.

Assad Zaman Answers Interview With the Vampire Season 2 Fan Questions

As far as vampires go, is Armand a good guy? “I think he is as complicated as any vampire, any human being,” says Zaman.

If you were to see Louis and Armand (Loumand, as the fandom calls them) at a restaurant, Zaman says you’d think they make an “absolutely adorable” couple. You’d hope that to be true after being together for seven decades. “There’s a lot of soft affection with Armand and Louis,” Zaman explains. “I only say that because — I don’t know if rightly or not — I’m comparing it to the affection that Louis and Lestat have, and I think that’s different. I think this is more tender. People would see a tenderness.”

It’s not all saccharine romance between these live-in partners (though there will be plenty of swoon-worthy moments). Armand is hundreds of years older than Louis and Lestat, and while he and Lestat share the gift of flight, we’ll spend the season discovering Armand’s unique abilities — namely, how they’ve been employed since the original interview.

Armand “has ancient power,” Zaman teases, but “his power lies in something more than the superpowers of a vampire. There’s a lot of religious symbolism in power.”

Larry Horricks/AMC

Bogosian’s Daniel was perplexed and terrified by the sudden recollection that he’d met Armand before. How could he forget that? Memory is a monster, as the Season 2 tagline says. But is the monster the act of recovering suppressed memories (the new purpose of the Dubai interview), or is this referencing something more insidious? Louis was an unreliable narrator in Season 1, and sneak peeks from Season 2 show Louis and Armand invading Daniel’s memories. What else can vampires do while infiltrating human minds? Can these vampires — who can read every mind except for their makers’ and fledglings’ — affect each others’ thoughts?

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In the Paris timeline in Part 2, we’ll see Louis and Armand’s origin story, but their courtship and love affair will prove to have devastating consequences both in the past and in the future, and Daniel will probe to get to the truths buried within the memories. As Bogosian tells us of Zaman’s performance, “When you realize by the end what [Armand’s] been doing, he’s fantastic. I love it.”

We’ll see more San Francisco flashbacks this season. “That’s some wild sh*t,” Bogosian says. “San Francisco 1973 is a whole other realm.” A teaser aired during an episode of The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live on March 17 showed Armand with Young Daniel (Luke Brandon Field) in this timeline.

“I’m the quiet you’ve been longing for,” a chilling Armand says to the young journalist, who struggles with drug addiction. “After all the garishness of life, the jostling, the clawing, an easeful death.” This Armand is a far cry from the tender, flirtatious, debonair being who woos Anderson’s “reticent vampire.” Zaman previously told TV Insider that Armand’s plot in Part 2 helps lay the groundwork for potential future seasons.

“Having Armand in the room in Dubai in this version opens up the other books [in The Vampire Chronicles series] quicker for an audience who hasn’t read them. We’re not throwing all of Anne Rice‘s work on the screen. We’re planting the seed,” he said. “I think it was planting in Season 1, and here in Season 2 we get to watch those seeds grow and also plant more seeds for the future, which is really exciting.”

Assad Zaman for TV Insider (Maarten de Boer)

Back in Europe, Louis and Claudia (Delainey Hayles) will be searching for more vampires. Their hunt leads them to Paris, where they’ll meet Armand. As Zaman teases above, Armand learns of Louis’ presence “as soon as Louis lands on European soil.” As for Louis, he’s more painfully aware of the lingering presence of the presumed-dead Lestat that wracks his guilt. “Louis is carrying Lestat with him kind of literally,” Anderson said, “and in that is going to massively affect the beginning of the new relationship [with Armand].”

Zaman can’t wait for fans to meet the coven that makes up the Théâtres des Vampires company. “They are a beautiful bunch of people” and are the ones to “watch out” for in the new episodes. Among that group is Ben Daniels as Santiago, a book character who will greatly impact Louis and Claudia. The scenes with this lively, chaotic, lethal, horny hive provided needed levity on set.

“It’s easy with a show like this, because of the material, because of how heavy it can be sometimes, you need some catharsis,” Zaman says. “Every time I was on set with them, they have so much fun. We let go of some steam.”

Those who have read Interview With the Vampire know the heavy material to which Zaman refers. For those who don’t, buckle up.

— Reporting by Damian Holbrook

Interview With the Vampire, Season 2 Premieres Sunday, May 12, 9/8c, AMC and AMC+