The actor that rises from Sommers’ laboratory table in the role is critically acclaimed actor Shuler Hensley, who received the Tony Award for his portrayal of another dark, misunderstood character—Jud Fry from Oklahoma! (a role he also performed opposite Hugh Jackman in the original London revival). Sommers and Ducsay went to see the Broadway production; two days later, Hensley came in to read for the role of the monster and was cast immediately. “Shuler just did a knockdown job,” says Sommers.
Hensley felt that in the subsequent tellings of the tale since the publication of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the Monster has often been portrayed incorrectly. The actor explains, “He is one of those creatures that has a good side to him. Because of circumstance, he’s forced to become something he wouldn’t have become otherwise. Once you get past his exterior—the shock of his physical body—what’s on the inside begins to be revealed.”
Hensley says he was particularly drawn to the way the monster is written in Van Helsing—as a sympathetic character and one of the movie’s heroes. Sommers explains that both Van Helsing and Anna are accustomed to dispatching monsters—“taking care of them before they take care of you.” But Van Helsing has a sixth sense when it comes to evil and understands that even if someone looks like a monster, he may not necessarily be monstrous. Even though Anna only sees his frightening external appearance, Van Helsing sees what is underneath and comes to rely on the giant to help him in his cause.
Like Frankenstein, the werewolf is one of several creatures associated in the public’s mind with the vampire, all of them occupying the same fog-shrouded, moonlit Eastern European landscape of legend. According to Sommers, “After watching the original The Wolf Man, I thought that this character was a really tormented soul—he wants to be a good person but he just can’t help his nature. You feel a lot of sympathy for him. He’s a decent guy who doesn’t want to be doing what he’s doing, but with every full moon, he cannot stop his transformation.”
A werewolf first enters Van Helsing when Anna Valerious’ brother, Velkan, tries to use himself as bait to capture one of the creatures. Unfortunately, the plan goes horribly wrong and the young prince is attacked and bitten by the very beast he’s hunting. Velkan must deal with the fact that he, too, will become a Wolf Man, since the bite of the creature has infected him with the curse.
“I think we all have our own ‘wolf’ we’re trying to suppress—one that we’d like to let loose now and again,” says actor Will Kemp, who plays Velkan. Primarily a dancer featured in leading roles in several works by pioneering British choreographer/director Matthew Bourne, Kemp welcomed the change of pace, particularly the physical challenge of playing Velkan as he transforms into The Wolf Man (the final creature being the domain of CGI).
He reflects, “When I first read the part, I thought, ‘Oh, great, I get to run around here and jump here—how heroic.’ Then as I read further I thought, ‘Wait, who is actually going to be doing this?’ I was in harnesses, flying around the woods, swinging from trees, running up walls. My training helped tremendously, but the filming, the different stuff I had to do was absolutely abnormal. But then how wonderful to have a chance to be in such an abnormal process.”
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