Universal spent $65M on Renfield, a Dracula spinoff about a nobody

Universal, mid-effort to relaunch its classic-monster line, greenlit Renfield as a comedic take on Dracula's long-suffering servant and cast Nicolas Cage as the Count. The $65 million budget was modest by blockbuster standards but large for a horror-comedy aimed at a niche genre fanbase.

It opened on 14 April 2023 to $8 million in the US and Canada, one of the year's weakest starts, and finished with $26.5 million worldwide. The self-aware, gore-comic tone pitched at critics more than crowds, and reviews were lukewarm.

The film never found its audience: it was neither broad enough for mainstream comedy nor scary enough for horror fans, and its ties to a planned monster universe muddied the pitch. The big-screen monster revival it was meant to feed quietly lost momentum.

Renfield's failure came amid Universal's wider struggle to relaunch its classic monsters, reinforcing that the studio's monster IP had little pull on its own. The film stands as a clear loss on a franchise-building bet.