It’s sort of fascinating that a vampire craze born from Twilight has shifted back toward Bram Stoker’s original vision: Tom Cruise and Sony are going vampire hunting with Van Helsing; Neil Marshall is boarding The Voyage of the Demeter; and now Russell Crowe might bring his Oscar statue to the set of Harker to play Dracula for Eli Roth.

According to Deadline Romania, Roth is currently in talks to take over the chair for the Warners project where Jaume Collet-Serra used to sit.

First of all, the prospect of Crowe taking on a classic character like this is pretty damned exciting. Granted, his Robin Hood was hampered by a lame movie, but Crowe would be walking in Bela Lugosi’s and Gary Oldman’s shoes (just to name a few). Secondly, it’s nice to see such a dusty character have so much life left in him – especially since it seems studios are more interested in a return to form (instead of simply sprinkling more glitter on everything).