The film was lensed in Melbourne, Australia, where director Michael Rymer was born. "I knew that there was a very strong theatre base in Melbourne and that we'd be able to draw from a very rich pool of talent when casting our supporting roles. That certainly turned out to be true."
The architecture in Melbourne meant that it could easily double for Victorian England, but locations were also found that worked for New York, Los Angeles, New Orleans, the Caribbean and an island near Italy. "When we saw we could find all those locations in Melbourne," Rymer states, "we really didn't consider going anywhere else."
The first footage shot for Queen of the Damned covered three full-length music videos for Lestat and his band, clips of which are shown in the film. In so doing, the filmmakers were able to pay homage to some of their favorite classic horror movies, choosing The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Murnau's Nosferatu and Browning's Dracula as themes.
One of the key scenes in the film is a vast rock concert where the climactic battle between Akasha and the Ancient Vampires takes place. "The other vampires are pissed off at Lestat for becoming a rock star," explains Townsend. "So he decides to put on a big rock concert, knowing that they will flock to him to seek revenge."
Rymer was faced with logistical difficulties when choosing a site for the grandiose concert to take place. "In the book, Lestat's performance is held in an old- fashioned concert theater," he says, "which wasn't an option for us because we have vampires exploding and it's too dangerous to stage elaborate fire effects inside a structure like that. I was inspired by an event that happens every year in the California desert called Burning Man, which is a kind of neo-pagan gathering. So we put the concert into Death Valley and had a gathering of the tribes. It's not explicit, but in essence, Lestat is summoning Akasha with his music and this setting made it less just a performance but more of a religious ceremony of sorts."
The actual concert took place over three very cold evenings in a disused Melbourne quarry. Bands were hired to entertain the mainly "Goth" crowd of extras, who were organized by various newspaper and radio announcements. Much of the shooting time was devoted to filming Townsend as Lestat on stage with his band, miming to a series of pre-recorded playbacks.
"There were two or three thousand people out there," recalls Townsend, "and I was truly terrified. It was like doing first night in the theatre with a new play except I had to sing and do the whole rock star thing. So I was very nervous. But it turned into what was easily the best filming experience of my life. There we were in the middle of nowhere — film meets rock concert meets gothic. The atmosphere was electric."
For his dramatic entrance, Lestat glides onto the stage from a great height. To achieve that effect Townsend had to be attached to a wire and lifted by a crane to a spot high above the crowd. "I watched the stuntman do it a few times and I thought Okay, not too bad, not too high, I'll do it, he recollects. "Suddenly I was up there and I was absolutely frozen. Terrified. If three thousand people hadn't been watching me I would have yelled at someone to get me down. But I think my pride overcame my fear and then it actually became even more fun than the concert. It was like one big bungee jump each time I went up."
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