I checked to see if this was already a topic, and while there has already been a poll about "best Dracula movie", there hasn't been one yet for the best ACTOR to play the great vampire, so here goes.

Who was the best big screen Count Dracula?

A note of explanation: I love all 3 versions of Nosferatu, which are all obviously based on Bram Stoker's novel, but I am not listing the 1922 or 2024 versions since technically the vampire is named Orlok. The 1979 version with Klaus Kinski DOES use the Dracula name so you will find it here.

Also, this is big-screen only. There have been some really good, or at least interesting, Draculas on the small screen, like Jack Palance in the Dan Curtis TV movie or Jonathan Rhys-Myers in the too-short 2013 TV series or the more recent British mini-series on Netflix. But since I can only list 15 options, I'm limiting it to theatrical films only.

With all due respect to Lugosi,my vote goes to Lee.

Bela Lugosi by an ever-lovin' mile.

I decided to open it up to 3 choices, since most people, myself included, will pick Lee or Lugosi, or both.

Christopher Lee

Bela for me.

Christopher Lee. Not really any more faithful an adaptation than the Lugosi version, but it had more life to it.

Lon Chaney, Jr., and George Hamilton? You've got to be kidding!

Actually I haven't seen many of these for myself, so I can't really compare. One that's not on the list is Louis Jordan, from a late 1970s version that originally aired on the BBC. I saw it on PBS as a teenager. I'd read the novel a year or two before, and IIRC that adaptation seemed pretty faithful to the original.

Frank Langella got my vote.

When I did my ten thousand word essay (back in 1995) for University, I wrote it about Dracula. I watched every movie version I could get my hands on over the course of two years. The one with Frank Langella, while not exactly like the novel, includes a scene where Dracula is a guest at dinner (the thirteenth guest, in fact) and doesn't eat his food, merely moving it about on the plate. This was a scene Stoker wrote but left out of the final version and I love that kind of attention to detail. Although the Langella one leaves out the 'ageing backwards' aspect of the character, most versions do the same thing.

I liked Langella's presence and his understated performance. I enjoyed the all-star cast, and despite the changes made (Mina is Van Helsing's daughter, Harker never visits Dracula in Transylvania as Dracula is simply shipwrecked on the English coast in this version), things like the final fight with Dracula aboard the ship (Stoker's original ending, which was revised into the train journey in the final published version) and the portrayal of Lucy and Mina as being under Dracula's spell...I do really like this version.

It's no less faithful to the novel than most movie versions and...I just like it.

What has happened here is shameful.

Bela's is the classic portrayal, but it's not my favourite. Just as Boris Karloff's portrayal is the classic Frankenstein's Monster...but it's not my favourite version, either.

Christopher Lee is charismatic in the role of Dracula, but I love that 1979 version much more. It's extremely tense and less...well, films from the 1930's have a uniquely stylish quality to them but the Langella one just feels more nightmarishly real to me. It's less theatrical than the Lugosi version, but it still impresses me.

It's Christopher Lee for me as well, although since I changed it to allow 3 options, I threw in a 2nd vote for Lugosi as well.

But though nothing in any of the Lee films matches the atmosphere of those first 15 minutes or so in Dracula's castle in the Lugosi film, I find Lee to be a much more imposing and terrifying figure, with the added physicality as a bonus. Not sure if this makes sense, but with Lugosi, to the extent that his film is, or once was, frightening, it's the idea of vampirism in general and being the victim of one that's scary, whereas with the Lee films, it's Christopher Lee himself who is terrifying.

I'll also support Simon and say that I really enjoy Langella's Dracula, both the performance and the film.

I'm glad no one else can see us.

Frank Langella was in that sweet envious spot for me between 1974–1987 where he got to play Zorro,
Dracula, Skeletor, Leonardo da Vinci, and even Sherlock Holmes and Jean Lafitte in some TV episodes.

I voted for him, Lee, and Bela.

Christopher Lee. Stone killer in real life.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=6Xmz-p9FYW8 ... HqbwwqJIRZ

This used to be my ringtone

I'm not saying the others were bad....just that I found that particular movie compelling. I've re-read Stoker's novel more than I've re-read anything else in my life, and it's a singularly beguiling piece of writing. I think the Langella film captures the essence of the novel even if it changes the circumstances.

Dracula is a monster dressed as an aristocrat, and he manages to seduce women without even really trying. He's a cleverly created existential threat - and it's interesting that the novel was written by an Irishman who was trying his best to fit into polite society in England (Stoker was the manager of London's Lyceum Theatre for 27 years). The idea of a foreign aristocrat casually seducing virtuous young English women, turning them into monsters like himself, was guaranteed to horrify and disturb the well-to-do Victorian-era Londoners who attended the theatre. It was also guaranteed to fascinate them.

Stoker, as an outsider trying to pass, was uniquely qualified to write something this cleverly observed (IMO).

I am not a fan of the original Dracula, let alone Lugosi’s role in it.