As a rule, vampire musicals inexorably lead to financial and critical bloodbaths, but that doesn’t stop our entertainers from giving them a go, over and over again. As Elton John’s Anne Rice-derived Lestat premieres, it’s high time for a comparison of musicals that suck.

CARMILLA: A VAMPIRE’S TALE

The Desecration

Ben Johnston and famed playwright-director Wilford Leach turned Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s 1872 novella about a female vampire into a multimedia opera, which debuted at La MaMa in 1970.

Lyrical Selections

Musical numbers include “A Saunter, Twilight,” “A Funeral Passed By,” and “A Mountebank, the Amulet.”

Subtle Visual Touches

Video projections were ahead of their time, and supporting characters popped out as wooden faces from within the couch the leads were sitting on.

Critical Bites

Newsday on a 1986 revival: “Like the serpentine arms that came out from that partly alive settee, the musical play reached out, wrapping its audience in an aura of mystery.”

Worldly Success

After its initial six-week run, Carmilla became a cult hit. La MaMa revived it (usually with the original performers) in 1972, 1976, 1986, and 2003.

POSSESSED: THE DRACULA MUSICAL

The Desecration

Bram Stoker’s classic transferred to modern England-Dracula’s slave Renfield is a mad rock musician, and his master ensnares him by posing as a record promoter.

Lyrical Selections

“Love sucks! / It drains out all your blood / Love sucks! / You better listen to me, bud / And leave it to the donkeys, the doggies and the ducks (quack! quack!).”

Subtle Visual Touches

Lots of miming, prancing, and chase scenes attempted to make up for the low budget and eighties synth stylings.

Critical Bites

Alvin Klein for the Times: “Perhaps there are no bad ideas for musicals, only bad musicals, like this one.”

Worldly Success

Opened and closed in a flash in December 1987, in Teaneck, New Jersey-but one song has become part of the Three Mo’ Tenors repertoire.

DANCE OF THE VAMPIRES

The Desecration

Meat Loaf songwriter Jim Steinman transformed Roman Polanski’s 1967 vampire spoof, The Fearless Vampire Killers, into a comic extravaganza. Originally written in German.

Lyrical Selections

“Garlic Garlic, when times are tough and grave / Garlic Garlic, it’s a remedy we crave.” (Plus, “Vampires in Love” is identical to “Total Eclipse of the Heart.”)

Subtle Visual Touches

A massive, stenciled-out evil vampire face framed the entryway toward the front of the stage.

Critical Bites

Charles Isherwood in Variety: “It’s not an outright comedy . . . but as a serious musical-well, it’s pretty da