Jonathan Bailey Gives Count Dracula a New Voice in Audible's Full-Cast Audiobook

Count Dracula has a new voice, and it belongs to Jonathan Bailey. Audible's full-cast audiobook of Bram Stoker's novel is available through its Audible Originals label, and the Guardian has named its review of the production Audiobook of the week.

A full-cast audiobook means that each major character is played by a different performer, rather than one narrator reading every part. Bailey voices Dracula himself. Louis Partridge voices Jonathan Harker, Ella Purnell voices Mina, and Aimee Lou Wood voices Lucy. David Jonsson plays the doctor who tends to Lucy, and Maggie Gyllenhaal voices the vampire hunter Van Helsing. Johnny Flynn is also part of the narrating cast, according to Audible's product page.

The production was directed by Mary Lambert, who made her audiobook directing debut with it, BroadwayWorld reported in September. Robyn Aherne adapted the novel for audio, and Ilan Eshkeri composed the score. The full recording runs 5 hours and 57 minutes.

Audible has framed the project as part of a wider set of all-star global adaptations of the novel. Its English-language version is the one starring Bailey. Audible also published a cast guide on its blog on 1 October, titled "Who's who in the all-star cast of Bram Stoker's Dracula."

In its review, published on 29 October, the Guardian describes the production as cinematic horror with an A-list cast. The paper's reviewer calls it an immersive retelling, with shock and gore along the way. The review sits alongside the paper's wider run of audiobook coverage, and the Guardian's books listing gave it a slot at 11.00 EDT that morning.

For readers who know the story mostly from the page or the screen, an audiobook offers a different route in. The listener hears the letters, diary entries and newspaper cuttings that make up Stoker's book read aloud by a cast of voices, one after another. Audiobooks like this one reach listeners through apps and subscriptions, and they are often heard on a commute, on a walk or while doing chores.

Stories like this one also reach a library or bookshop in a slightly different way. Audio productions are commissioned, recorded and sold on their own terms, separate from the print edition. That is why a new recording can reach people who have never picked up the original novel at all.