Watch out for vampires’ fangs

HBO’s coming drama, “True Blood,” is based on the Charlaine Harris series of books set in the backwoods of Louisiana, in a world where vampires and humans coexist but vampires are treated as outcasts. The series debuts Sept. 7.

Asked if vampires carried an underlying message about gay rights, executive producer Alan Ball told reporters Thursday there’s no hidden message. “I really don’t look at the vampire as a metaphor for gays,” he said.

“For me, part of the fun of this whole series is that it’s about vampires, so it’s not that serious,” he said. “However, they do work as a metaphor for gays . . . for anyone that’s misunderstood. At the same time it’s not a metaphor at all.”

Ball, creator of HBO’s former hit series “Six Feet Under,” said he didn’t come to the project as a vampire enthusiast. “I haven’t seen ‘Buffy’ or ‘Angel.’ I’ve never read the Anne Rice books. All I knew was the movies I’d seen,” he said.

So he took pains to ground his vamps in the real world. In “True Blood,” most of the myths about vampires were created by vampires themselves so that they could pass for humans. When staked, they don’t always instantaneously turn to dust. They’ve also got cooler fangs.

“We went to great pains to depict the fangs,” Ball said. “They’re like rattlesnake ones that click forward.”

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-- D.M.