El Diario Vasco has shared some new Vampire Academy shooting photos!
It is a highly-budgeted production, with six months of shooting the ten first episodes of the series, and with a large technical team. Yesterday there were three different units shooting scenes in Donostia, Viana and Pamplona.
The filming of the series ‘Vampire Academy’ has moved this week to Donostia, specifically to the Miramar Palace and its surroundings. Since October, the television adaptation of the popular saga written by Richelle Mead has been filming in Navarra, mainly in Olite. After six days of the crew occupying the palace they spent another day at the María Cristina hotel.
It is a highly-budgeted production, with six months of shooting the ten episodes, and with a large technical team. Yesterday there were three different units shooting scenes in Donostia, Viana and Pamplona.
‘Vampire Academy’ follows the story of Rose Hathaway -half human, half vampire-whose mission is to protect her best friend, Princess Lissa Dragomir -have very special powers- from vampires that never die, the Strigoi. This situation will lead them to the St. Vladmir Academy, whereas both vampire royalty (and non-royalty) and their future guardians are trained. The protagonist will find herself trapped in a forbidden attraction with her instructor, Dimitri Belikov, while dealing with the inexplicable, peculiar and unbreakable bond with her friend.
Kissing at the Pico del Loro
The Pico del Loro hosted this Monday one of the key scenes of the first season. From the railing of La Concha, people could see actress Sisi Stringer, who plays Rose Hathaway, running to the balustrade, stopped and was staring at the horizon, before being interrupted by a hooded man. The wooden man is no other than Kieron Moore, who portrays Dimitri Belikov. The culminating moment came when both, after fooling around for a while, melted into a kiss.
Most of the filming takes place in Olite, specifically in the Royal Palace and in the San Francisco convent, where the logistics center for this production is located. Scenes have also been recorded in the Irache Monastery, Bodegas Otazu and Pamplona. The Government of Navarra estimates that this first season last year represented a direct investment in the regional community of 5,400,000 euros. The forecast for this year is another five million until the end of filming in March. Thus, the total planned investment in Navarra for the series amounts to 10,400,000 euros. In addition, it is estimated that the multiplier effect of the investment is three times for each euro contributed, with a value of 30 million euros of direct, indirect and induced impact. They have also moved to the Alfajería de Zaragoza.
The creator of the series Julie Plec, who is a writer, alongside Marguerite MacIntyre, are also the executive producers and showrunners of Vampire Academy. It is not the first time that Julie Plec has been in charge of a project about vampire romances for teenagers, from ‘Vampire Diaries’ and the two ‘spin-off’: ‘The Originals’ and ‘Legacies ‘. She has also been a producer and screenwriter on all three seasons of ‘Kyle XY’ and directed an episode of ‘Riverdale’.
A project from years ago
‘Vampire Academy’ is a project that Plec had in mind for years. In 2015 Plec took the social media to express this and on various interviews stated that the new VA series will have ‘the elegance of aristocratic romance’ with the ‘supernatural emotion of the vampire genre’. Moreover Plec, wants to present the series as a modern day version of ‘Bridgerton’ with vampires.
Australian actress Sisi Stringer (1997), one of the protagonists, caught the attention of the producers when she demonstrated her expertise in martial arts in the version released last year of ‘Mortal Kombat’. British actor, Kieron Moore has participated in several episodes of the third season of ‘Sex Education’. The Moroi princess Lissa Dragomir, is played by Daniela Nieves. Social outcast Christian Ozera is played by André Dae Kim. Also part of the cast, J. August Richards as Victor Dashkov, Anita-Joy Uwajeh as Tatiana Vogel, Mia McKenna-Bruce as Mia Karp, Rhian Blundell as Meredith, Jnoetta Kaiser as Sonja Karp, and Andrew Liner as Mason Ashford.
It is not the first time that this saga of ‘bloodsuckers’ has been adapted. In 2014 it was brought to the big screen and received numerous negative comments from critics and fans.
The series will be available exclusively on Peacock, the streaming service owned by NBC Universal in the United States, and it is not yet known on which platform it will be broadcasted in Spain. At the moment, the contract is for a first season but the producers are already considering starting pre-production for the second and have not ruled out a third.
Article written by Teresa Flano, translated using Google Translator
Vampire Academy Source 