Trivia: Kirsten Dunst (Claudia) had her first on screen kiss, with a much older Brad Pitt, in this film.
Trivia: At 5'7, Tom Cruise was shorter than Lestat de Lioncourt (the character he played), who towered over the characters in the book version. Cruise was placed on elevated platforms to emphasize Lestat's height difference from the other vampires.
Trivia: River Phoenix was cast as the interviewer but died before shooting began. He was then replaced by Christian Slater who donated his entire salary to River's favourite charity projects.
Trivia: The part of Daniel Malloy was originally given to River Phoenix but as principal photography rolled he died of a drug overdose outside Johnny Depp's' Viper Room. The part had to be recast quickly and Christian Slater got the job. If you look right at the end of the credits you will see the film is dedicated to River.
Answer: The first problem was finding a child actor capable of playing the role - Armand is an extraordinarily complex character and it's highly questionable that a child actor could have played him to the requirements of the script. Secondly, there are some extremely homosexual overtones in the relationship between Louis and Armand (and, for that matter, Louis and Lestat) - while the film just about manages to get away with the relationship between Louis and Claudia, it's extremely likely that there would have been major problems with the censors and critics at any attempt to portray the relationship between Louis and a child Armand. The requirements of the story dictated that Claudia needed to be a child, but there's nothing that insists the same for Armand - hence the eventual decision to up his age.
Tailkinker ★