Grandmother from southern Romania stars in new Nosferatu movie

A 74-year-old woman named Gherghina from the southern Romanian county of Teleorman stars in the new Nosferatu film along with Bill Skarsgard, Nicholas Hoult, and Lily-Rose Depp.

The Romanian woman is a star on TikTok, where she has over 700,000 followers, and her inclusion in the movie was announced by director Robert Eggers in an extensive interview with Empire magazine. She was added to provide a layer of authenticity to the film, according to Eggers.

"She’s known as ‘Grandmother’ and has a TikTok account managed by her granddaughter, where she cooks traditional Romanian food. That’s how I found her," explained Eggers, a director renowned for his attention to detail applied to chilling horrors.

"She’s from southern Romania but managed to do a Transylvanian accent for the film. I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference, but she can," he added.

In one scene, Thomas Hutter, the real estate agent played by Nicholas Hoult, arrives at a small Transylvanian village on his way to Count Orlok’s castle in the Carpathians.

“After working his way through a sea of Roma actors, dancers, and musicians dressed in early 19th century Romany garb (captured, it’s worth nothing, in a crane-assisted oner), our man Hutter enters an inn, where one particularly anguished, remarkably real-feeling old lady desperately tries to warn the young realtor not to go to Orlok’s abode," as Eggers told Empire.

The remake of Nosferatu is set for an international premiere on December 25 and will debut in Romanian theaters on January 3. It will be Eggers’ reinterpretation of the 1922 silent cult classic by German director F.W. Murnau.

The original movie is obviously inspired by Dracula, but since Murnau never obtained legal approval from Stoker’s heirs, the writer's widow sued Prana Film, the German studio behind the movie, and won a court order for the destruction of all copies. However, a few survived, and were favored by the public.

Robert Eggers first announced in 2015 that he had secured funding for a Nosferatu remake. However, the project faced numerous delays, setbacks, and challenges over the years.

The new movie will also star legendary actor Willem Dafoe, who will play Prof. Albin Eberhart Von Franz, a character inspired by Prof. Van Helsing from Stoker’s novel. The movie was entirely shot in Prague, despite the trailer featuring Corvin Castle in Hunedoara, according to