Last Vampire books: Eastenders scriptwriter and Hollywood director buy rights to Yorkshire children's books

Now two of Hall’s protégés have joined forces themselves to breathe new life into his Last Vampire series of children’s books.

Hall’s original books from the 1980s told the story of a boy called Henry who comes into contact with a vegetarian vampire.

Now the story is being reimagined for a new generation by Hollywood TV director Ed Fraiman and former EastEnders and The Bill scriptwriter Mark Johnson, who were both mentored by Hall when they were students at the Northern Film School in Leeds.

Hall, who died in 2005, helped them with the creation of a 1996 film they made called Guardian Angel which launched both of their careers.

Fraiman and Johnson have completed the first of what they hope will be a series of seven books now involving a girl character called Henri and a vampire who is vegetarian by choice rather than circumstance, as in the original series.

Speaking to The Yorkshire Post over a video call, Santa Monica-based Fraiman says the idea of adapting the books came about organically during the pandemic when he, his wife and children all got Covid in succession and had to quarantine for several weeks.

"When I moved over from the UK to the States, I brought very few things with me but I brought some books. When I went through and found this old dusty copy of The Last Vampire that Willis had given me, I started reading it to the children.

"It was a great piece of writing but it was a product of its time and era so I modernised it to make it relevant to today and bring down the reading age a bit. I basically improvised as I was reading it. They were captivated by the characters and what I loved about the book was I thought it could appeal to adults too.

"I had this idea we could update it and make the vampire’s vegetarianism a lifestyle choice. In our story he does yoga and is a bit of a New Agey-type character.

"Willis was our mentor 27 years ago and there was only one person to call, which was Mark to see whether he was available, interested and had the appetite to write a children’s book based on Willis’s material.”

Fraiman, who has directed hit TV shows such as The 100, The Flash and Merlin, got back in touch with Johnson, who wrote for EastEnders and The Bill before leaving the industry for teaching.

Johnson, who now lives in Meltham and teaches performing arts and musical theatre at Huddersfield New College, says: “I just jumped at the opportunity. I loved Willis’s writing and his visionary ideas and I thought it would be lovely to look at the books again and reimagine them.”

The pair have worked on the project over video calls between the UK and US and after securing the book rights in November 2022 have only just recently finished the first book.

Fraiman explains: “My brother Richard has worked in publishing and we brought him in for his business knowledge with me and Mark as the creative voices. We set up a writers’ room with Willis as kind of the fourth voice in the room and it really felt like he was a partner.

"With Book One, we’ve probably drawn the most from his book and with every book that follows, we’ve taken more poetic license and the final book is completely unique about the vampire going on trial. It has taken us a very long time as we are perfectionists.”

The project has resurrected memories of their work with Hall on Guardian Angel at the start of their careers.

Hall was initially allocated as Johnson’s scriptwriting mentor and the latter would post him his scripts before visiting his house in Ilkley to get feedback on them.

He recalls: "I was quite intimidated to meet the great Willis Hall. But he was warm, generous with his time and funny. He could be pretty blunt but in a really lovely way. We remained friends from that point up until his death in 2005. They were great days."

Fraiman adds: “I fell in love with Mark’s script and ended up inheriting Willis as a mentor. He was the first person in the industry to really see me and accept me as a director. It was a turning point for me. I thought if Willis Hall sees me as a director, then I can be a director. It was validation.”

Guardian Angel was a gritty story about a drug addict being kidnapped by a stranger and taken to a cottage in the Yorkshire countryside. It gradually emerges over the course of the film that her kidnapper is her estranged father.

The film was shown on Yorkshire Television and won two international awards, resulting in both Fraiman and Johnson being signed by agents while still students.

Fraiman says Hall’s influence was vital in making it a success; not only advising them from a story perspective to delay the reveal of the kidnapper’s identity but also encouraging them to think ambitiously about casting.

"He put wind in our sails and we approached a big casting director who helped us cast and we secured John Alderton and Suzanna Hamilton. We were a film school production but we ended up with a professional cast. Willis always encouraged us to reach for the skies and not see the limitations of things but look at the opportunities instead.”

That approach is one both men share for The Last Vampire series. While book publishing rights are still being negotiated, Fraiman says he believes what they are creating has the potential to be adapted for the small or even big screen.

"If things go as I hope, we're looking at not just books but films or a TV series. I wanted to write the books so we didn’t have a producer saying, ‘That sequence is too expensive’ or ‘Those visual effects will cost x, y and z’. We wanted to write the story without those restrictions but it is crying out to be made as a film. You could cast one of the knights of British theatre in the role of the vampire. Nothing would make me happier to make that film in Yorkshire and return to where it all started.”

In the new books, Henri and her family are from Leeds and the plot features a Yorkshire Post journalist called Van (short for Vanessa) English, whose name is an anagram for Van Helsing.

The pair are in regular contact with the Hall family and say they hope Willis would be pleased with what they are producing.

Johnson says: “I would hope that he would feel proud of the fact that he steered our careers and I would hope he would feel flattered we are looking at his work again and breathing new life into it, re-establishing a creative relationship with him and still learning from him.”

Fraiman says it has been particularly special working in partnership with Johnson.

“Willis was a legendary writer but much of his greatest work came in collaboration with Keith. We have worked in collaboration with each other as well as Willis and I personally think we have created something better because of that.

"Mark is a great writer with a great voice. I have helped with the structure and fleshing out some of the plot beats but his ability to write character and dialogue is fantastic. He is a wordsmith and I’m more of a sculptor, crafting the story.”

Johnson adds: “It has been magical. It is rare in life to develop a professional working relationship with someone where the project puts a smile on your face whenever you are engaged with it. We have always said from the very beginning that this needed to be fun and it is fun.

"With it being based in Yorkshire, it has come back to the territory where it all began and there is something really lovely about that.”