Trivia / True Blood

• Cast the Runner-Up: According to the Ultimate Fan Experience Q&A shown before the third season premiere, Alexander Skarsgård had originally auditioned for the role of Bill Compton, not Eric. Imagine that.
• Creator Backlash: Deborah Ann Woll admitted in a podcast that she was disappointed with how Jessica's story played out in the last season, believing that Jessica should have either traveled the world or become Queen of Louisiana as opposed to marrying Hoyt.
• Defictionalization: Of a sort - you can buy TruBlood in the real world, but it's a blood orange flavor drink, not synthetic blood.
• Fake American:
  • New Zealander via Canada Anna Paquin as Sookie Stackhouse.
  • Australian Ryan Kwanten as Jason Stackhouse.
  • Englishman Stephen Moyer as Bill Compton.
  • Slovenian-American Željko Ivanek as the Magister Jorge Alonso de San Diego, born a Spaniard (he'd been an Inquisitor), though he posed as various nationalities over the years.
  • Irishwoman Fiona Shaw as Marnie Stonebrook.
  • Played with for Eric Northman, who is originally from Sweden, much like Alexander Skarsgård. But Eric has lived in the United States since the 19th century, and so has adapted an American accent along the way.
• Fake Nationality: Indian-American Janina Gavankar as Native American/Latino Luna Garza.
• The Nth Doctor: Claude's change of actors (Neil Hopkins to Giles Matthey) was explained by faeries being able to change their appearance at will. Also a bit of a Take That! to Hopkins since Sookie commented that new!Claude's old look was unattractive and had "meth teeth."
• The Other Darrin:
  • Caroline Bellefleur was recast between her appearances in seasons 4 and 6. Incidentally, this came with a marked change in personality from an elegant and good-natured Grande Dame to an overbearing, senile, Racist Grandma.
  • James was recast with Nathan Parsons in the final season due to previous actor Luke Grimes not wanting to do a gay romance storyline.
• The Other Marty: Tara was originally going to be played by Brook Kerr; her scenes in the pilot were reshot with replacement Rutina Wesley.
• Queer Character, Queer Actor:
  • Rutina Wesley plays Tara, who it turns out is a bisexual woman. She became engaged to a woman in 2017, albeit after the series ended , and like Tara had been with men before (though Wesley doesn't label herself).
  • Danielle, a werewolf who's bisexual (or at least willing to get intimate with a woman at times) was played by Jamie Gray Hyder, who's said she has been with both men and women (while also not labeling herself).
  • Evan Rachel Wood, who's openly bisexual, plays bisexual vampire Queen Sophie-Anne.
  • Gay actor Denis O'Hare also plays the gay vampire Russell Edgington.
• Real Song Theme Tune: "Bad Things", written and performed by country music singer-songwriter Jace Everett.
• Romance on the Set:
  • Anna Paquin (Sookie) is now married to Stephen Moyer (Bill).
  • Amelia Rose Blair (Willa) is now married to Bryan Dechart (Dave^note the man she is seen feeding off of in an alley in Death Is Not The End).
• Technology Marches On: With cellphones, a switch from small flip and keypad phones to touchscreen happens in season 4 at least for some characters as Tara receives a text on one while in New Orleans.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Katee Sackhoff was approached for the role of Debbie Pelt. Sadly, she turned it down.
  • James Marsters auditioned for a role, but was deemed "not tall enough" for the part by the producers.
  • Originally, Claudine Crane was set to appear in the Pilot episode where she would have helped Sookie when the Rattarays first attack her. Alan Ball later cut this because he decided it would give away too much information about the faeries and would also spoil the surprise of what Sookie was suppose to be.
  • Amy and Jason's last V trip in season 1 was initially suppose to have the skies raining blood. However, the production team realized it would be difficult to film due to turning the grass red, as well as the hassle with constancy removing and reapplying fake blood to the actors, and they decided it would be easier to film with regular rain.
  • According to Denis O'Hare, there was a deleted scene from season 3 where Eric would have offered himself to Russell as his son as part of his ongoing deception. Russell would have been moved to accept this due to never having a son prior to being turned into a vampire, which would later make Eric's treachery in the later episodes all the more personal to Russell.
  • Initially, Debbie was suppose to die in season 3 during her confrontation with Sookie. However, the writers were so impressed with Brit Morgan's performance that they decided to keep her around for another season and explore the idea of whether or not Debbie could redeem herself.
  • The fight at Sookie's house in season 4 between Bill and Eric was going to be messier, with pieces of furniture and parts of the house getting destroyed in the process. However, when the set designer pointed out that objects in Sookie's house were one-of-a-kind and couldn't be broken and later replaced, the production team decided to tone down the fight.
  • Initially, Nan was going to have a Grossout Fakeout scene in season 4 where it would look like she was having sex when she was actually getting a pedicure. The scene was later cut because the way it was shot was deemed "confusing" by the producers.
  • When Jason was afraid of turning into a werepanther in season 4, he was originally going to handcuff himself in a jail cell at the police station. However, the production team was unable to film at that particular location during the making of the episode, and Executive Producer Gregg Fienberg realized it would make more sense for Jason to isolate himself at home because he'd be scared of other people witnessing him turn into a werepanther.
  • Sookie was originally going to encounter Debbie and Alcide in wolf forms during the full moon in season 4, but this was later scrapped due to how expensive it was filming with real wolves.
  • One of the early scripts from season 5 would have had Sarah Newlin make an appearance.
  • A deleted scene from season 5 has Arlene consoling Sookie after she finds out that Tara was made into a vampire.
  • Following Eric's failed attempt to rescue Nora from the Authority in season 5, an additional scene would have shown Eric being repeatedly tortured by Nora with liquid silver nitrate and being forced to watch graphic images of human wars and carnage, with the implication that Eric was being kept awake for days, which is why he appears weak and defeated when he's later brought before Bill in the next episode.
  • According to Stephen Moyer, there was a scene in the season 6 premiere when Sam shoots an Authority guard, picks up the guards blood and guts, and proceeds to shove them into Luna's mouth in an attempt to revive her, and fails to do so because of how badly the skinwalking messed up Luna's body. However, this was later cut from the episode because it was believed it didn't move the story along.

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