Honestly, if anyone in Hollywood were going to be a secret immortal from the 1800s, it would be Nic Cage. The guy has this energy. It’s like he’s plugged into a different frequency than the rest of us. For years, a specific corner of the internet has been convinced that the Oscar winner isn't just a dedicated actor, but an actual, blood-drinking creature of the night.
It sounds like a bad creepypasta. But the Nicolas Cage vampire legend is actually rooted in a very real, very weird piece of history that went viral before "going viral" was even a standardized term.
The 1870 Photo That Started It All
The whole "Cage is a vampire" thing exploded back in 2011. An eBay seller named Jack Mord listed an original carte de visite from roughly 1870. The price tag? A cool $1 million.
The photo featured a man from Bristol, Tennessee, who looked—and there’s no other way to put this—exactly like Nicolas Cage. Same heavy brow. Same slightly melancholic eyes. Same distinctively long face. Mord wasn't just selling a look-alike photo; he was selling a theory. He claimed the image proved Cage was a "walking undead/vampire" who reinvents himself every 75 years or so.
The internet, naturally, lost its collective mind.
People started analyzing the ears. Skeptics pointed out that the man in the photo had slightly different lobes. Fans countered that maybe he’d had some "work" done over the last century and a half to stay fresh. It became one of those early-era memes that crossed over into actual mainstream news.
Eventually, the man himself had to address it. During an appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman in 2012, Cage shot down the rumors with classic Cage-ian logic. He pointed out that you can’t take a photograph of a vampire and that he doesn't drink blood. He also joked that the guy in the 1870 photo was a "slowed-down version" of himself.
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But for some, the denial was just part of the cover-up.
The Method Behind the Madness in Vampire's Kiss
Long before the eBay photo, Cage was already cementing his legacy in the world of the undead. If you want to understand the Nicolas Cage vampire mythos, you have to watch Vampire’s Kiss (1988).
It is, quite possibly, the most "Nic Cage" movie in existence.
He plays Peter Loew, a literary agent who slowly loses his mind and becomes convinced he’s turning into a vampire. This isn't a Twilight style transformation. It’s a messy, screeching, bug-eating descent into madness.
Most actors would use a fake prop for a scene involving insects. Not Cage.
To prove his commitment, he famously ate two live cockroaches on camera. He actually did a third take, but the director stuck with the first one because Cage's reaction was so visceral. He later said he’d never do it again and felt bad about it, but that moment essentially birthed the "Unhinged Nic Cage" persona we know today.
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He even asked for hot yogurt to be poured over his toes during a love scene to help him channel a specific type of passion. He calls this style "Nouveau Shamanism." It’s a mix of German Expressionism and Japanese Kabuki theater. It’s loud. It’s weird. And it’s exactly why people find it so easy to believe he might be supernatural.
Finally Sinking His Teeth Into Dracula
For decades, fans wondered why Cage had never actually played a "real" vampire. Sure, he did Vampire's Kiss, but Peter Loew was just a guy with mental health issues and plastic fangs.
That changed with Renfield (2023).
Finally, the Nicolas Cage vampire destiny was fulfilled. He stepped into the velvet cape of Count Dracula himself. This wasn't just a job for him; it was a tribute. Cage grew up watching Christopher Lee’s Dracula and Bela Lugosi’s 1931 classic.
In Renfield, he plays a narcissistic, toxic boss version of the Count. The makeup process was intense. At certain points in the film, Dracula is in a state of "regeneration," looking like a pile of rotting meat and exposed muscle.
Cage reportedly stayed in character on set. Not in a "I'm going to bite you" way, but in a way that maintained the aura of the character. Nicholas Hoult, who played the titular Renfield, mentioned in interviews that seeing Cage in full Drac-regalia was genuinely intimidating.
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Why We Want It to Be True
The reason this conspiracy theory persists isn't just because of a blurry 150-year-old photo. It’s because Nicolas Cage is one of the few remaining "true individuals" in Hollywood.
In an era of PR-trained actors and safe career moves, Cage is an outlier. He bought a haunted mansion in New Orleans (the Lalaurie Mansion). He owned a pet octopus. He once spent his fortune on dinosaur skulls and rare comic books. He lives the kind of life we expect an immortal being to live.
We want him to be a vampire because it makes the world more interesting.
What You Should Do Next
If you're still skeptical (or just a fan), here is how to properly dive into the Cage-vampire rabbit hole:
- Watch Vampire's Kiss first. Don't expect a horror movie. Expect a dark, surreal comedy about a man having a mental breakdown. Pay attention to the "ABC" scene.
- Look up the eBay photo comparison. Search for "Jack Mord Nicolas Cage 1870." Compare the bridge of the nose and the hairline. It’s genuinely eerie how close the resemblance is.
- Check out the Lalaurie Mansion history. Cage actually owned this "most haunted house in America" for a few years. It adds a whole other layer to his obsession with the macabre and New Orleans' vampire folklore.
- Finish with Renfield. It’s the perfect bookend to his career. It shows how much he’s refined his "over-the-top" style into something that can actually be poignant and scary at the same time.
The reality is likely that Nicolas Cage is just a guy with a very common face shape for people of certain European descents and a very uncommon work ethic. But as long as there are old photos in attics and actors willing to eat bugs for their craft, the legend of the immortal Nic Cage isn't going anywhere.