Solstice pagan traditions have been around for centuries and are still celebrated by many people today. The solstices, which occur in December and June, mark the longest and shortest days of the year and have been significant events in many cultures throughout history. In pagan traditions, the solstices are seen as times of transition and change. They are seen as opportunities to honor and connect with nature, as well as to reflect on the past and set intentions for the future. Many pagan traditions involve rituals and ceremonies that are performed during these times to celebrate and honor the solstices. One common tradition is the lighting of bonfires, which symbolize the warmth and light of the sun.

‘Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches’ Is a Middling Showcase for Alexandra Daddario: TV Review

Alexandra Daddario proved herself as a startlingly able performer on the first season of “The White Lotus,” revealing at the conclusion of her character’s arc a particular gift for depicting self-delusion, the ability to manipulate oneself into not seeing the plain truth. And now, on “Anne Rice‘s Mayfair Witches,” that talent is put to the test. Daddario (to whom I am not related) undergoes a series of personal trials as she uncovers the family history that situates her within a tradition of sorcery. And because we’re in on so much more of the story than is she, viewers will likely lose patience over time.

At the series’ start, Daddario’s Rowan Mayfair is a physician with a challenging personal life: Her mother is dying, cutting off both a sustaining relationship and the possibility of learning more about her genealogy. Rowan came to her mother through a closed adoption, and she suspects that she’s in possession of special abilities — fantasizing, for instance, about a gruff professional colleague coming to harm, for instance, she watches as he suddenly experiences a medical episode.

The clock has begun ticking for Rowan to come into an understanding of what it means to be a Mayfair woman; for many, it will tick too slowly. Rowan journeys to New Orleans to decode her history after discovering she is heir to a clan of witches. In the process, she meets Ciprien Grieve (Tongayi Chirisa), who has the ability to see into Rowan’s experience, as well as Lasher (Jack Huston) an entity of charisma and of malevolence. Relationships like these give all parties a lot to play, and moments of grand madness like Beth Grant, playing Rowan’s aunt, chewing up the scenery in a hateful rant, have, at least, a certain bonkers energy. (This series, based on a trilogy of novels by Anne Rice as part of AMC’s ongoing project of building a Rice creative universe, is in the debt of “American Horror Story: Coven” as well.)

But there’s a bit too much dross amid what works — a sign of the times in terms of series orders being bulked out beyond what the story can sustain, and a reminder that, as a writer, Rice was not known for the gift of concision. An episode called “The Thrall,” in which Rowan is trapped in a house of horrors, forces Rowan back into the same rooms, over and over again; the narrative comes to feel that way, too, as she circles around self-knowledge. And the show’s story can overreach what its visual palette can achieve well: A sequence in which Rowan, hallucinates her late birth mother, is characteristically pedestrian, lacking the flair and spice we might expect from a potion-induced fantasy in New Orleans.

Through it all, Daddario proves herself an able performer once again. Even as one wishes something more from the show surrounding her, she makes the part her own, projecting both intelligence and willful cluelessness, as the moment demands it. It’s she who makes Rowan feel like a rounded character, rather than an object to whom things keep on happening. And one leaves “Mayfair Witches” hoping for more, and better, work for a performer whose best sorcery isn’t the literal kind.

“Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches” will premiere on AMC and AMC+ on Sunday, January 8.

Mayfair Witches: Everything About The Alexandra Daddario Series

Anne Rice's The Mayfair Witches, starring Alexandra Daddario, will take place in the same universe as the Vampire Chronicles.

By Nathan Kamal | Updated 11 months ago

AMC Networks is going all-in on Anne Rice. The famed gothic fantasy novelist may have passed away in 2021, but her work seems poised for a major revival via prestige television adaptation. One of those is going to be Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches starring Alexandra Daddario.

Since the finales of some of their most acclaimed and popular shows like Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and Halt and Catch Fire the last several years, AMC has struggled to find a new flagship (since various Walking Deads are looking a little zombie-like). Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches has been announced as the second of their adaptations of her popular shared universe of vampires, witches, and various demons.

After Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire premieres in October 2022, The Mayfair Witches is already planned as the follow-up. Here’s what we know about the show so far:

ALEXANDRA DADDARIO IS DR. ROWAN MAYFAIR

The central character of Dr. Rowan Mayfair will be played by Alexandra Daddario. Hot off the success of Mike White’s HBO anthology show The White Lotus and Starz’ The Girlfriend Experience, Daddario will be portraying the brilliant neurosurgeon who discovers her family lineage of witches, magic, and some pretty traumatizing birthing experiences.

Rowan is described as being extremely beautiful and commanding but was separated from her immediate family and raised by distant relatives without knowledge of their extremely tortured lineage.

JACK HUSTON WILL STAR IN MAYFAIR WITCHES

In early May 2022 came the word that Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches recruited an amazing character actor for the series. As reported by TV Line and others, Jack Huston has been cast as Lasher. The character’s official series description says he is a “powerful, shape-shifting entity who has been bound to the Mayfair witches for hundreds of years.”

Huston is best known as the tragic Richard Harrow on HBO’s Boardwalk Empire. He later made a big splash as crooked detective Odis Weff on season 4 of the crime anthology series Fargo.

THE MAYFAIR WITCHES IS BASED ON THREE ANNE RICE NOVELS

Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches will be an adaptation of Lives of the Mayfair Witches, which is made up of three proper novels and several crossovers with her other big series about vampires who are very sad (but more on that in a minute).

The Mayfair Witches centers on the titular Mayfair family, a group of very rich oddballs in New Orleans (where most of Rice’s work tends to be set). The tone is somewhere between a very intense Southern Gothic in the style of Tennessee Williams (which is to say, lots of emotional repression, plus monologues) and a supernatural soap opera akin to Dark Shadows.

The central character of the series is Dr. Rowan Mayfair who returns to their ancestral Louisiana home and a bunch of freaky stuff involving very sexual ghosts, half-human children, and even freakier stuff. It’s all very intense, so it’ll be interesting to see how far AMC goes with the material.

THE MAYFAIR WITCHES IS IN THE SAME UNIVERSE AS THE VAMPIRE CHRONICLES

The Mayfair Witches takes place in the same shared universe as her more famous The Vampire Chronicles books. Several books crossed over and shared characters, including Merrick and Blackwood Farm. The Vampire Chronicles have already been adapted several times to feature films, with the Brad Pitt/Tom Cruise/Kirsten Dunst version of Interview with the Vampire being released in 1994 and Aaliyah-starring Queen of the Damned in 2002.

The former was decently well-received (although Anne Rice herself initially strongly disapproved of Tom Cruise being cast as her fan-favorite character Lestat, only to reverse and apologize for that later), while the latter was a critical bomb.

Given that AMC is rebooting the vampire aspect of the Riceverse (we’re going to get ahead of the curve and call it that) first, we undoubtedly will be seeing some crossovers between Interview with The Vampire Chronicles and The Mayfair Witches eventually.

THE CAST ALSO INCLUDES HARRY HAMLIN

Aside from Alexandra Daddario and Jack Huston, Harry Hamlin has also been cast. Hamlin starred in L.A. Law for five seasons (receiving three Golden Globe nominations), and later joined the cast of AMC’s own Mad Men. He will be playing Cortland Mayfair, the imperious, power-obsessed patriarch of the family, and Rowan’s father (under um, very bad conditions that will doubtlessly be revealed eventually).

One more cast member was announced for The Mayfair Witches. Tongayi Chirisa is joining the series as Ciprien Grieve. Chirisa has been acting for 17 years and got his first big break on the series Crusoe where he played Robinson Crusoe’s pal Friday. He is also known for The Jim Gaffigan Show and iZombie.

Given that the nature of The Mayfair Witches involves a sprawling family of magical weirdos, there doubtlessly will be more casting announcements in the near future to play the dandyish Julien Mayfair, the fiercely feminist Mona, the nearly comatose Deidre, and all the other fun ones.

THERE IS NO RELEASE DATE FOR ALEXANDRA DADDARIO’S MAYFAIR WITCHES SERIES

It is currently unknown when Anne Rice’s The Mayfair Witches will be premiering on AMC. What we do know is that the 8-episode series is now in production, and they are hoping for an early 2023 premiere date. We hope to have a firm date soon.

As mentioned before, it has already been announced to the second series in the network’s plan to build a universe around Rice’s works, so we will also have to wait and see when Interview with the Vampire is going to be released. It is also likely that we will begin hearing rumors of a solo show for the perennial favorite bad boy of Anne Rice’s work, Lestat de Lioncourt (who has already been announced to be played by Sam Reid).

We’ll keep you updated as we find out the scoops!

'Mayfair Witches' star Alexandra Daddario says she approached her character's 'toxic' demon lover like 'a relationship with the boyfriend you shouldn't go back to'

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Alexandra Daddario in "Mayfair Witches." AMC Networks

• Warning: Spoilers ahead for season one of "Anne Rice's Mayfair Witches."
• Alexandra Daddario plays the lead in "Anne Rice's Mayfair Witches," which airs on AMC on Sundays.
• Her character's "toxic" lover is like "the boyfriend you shouldn't go back to," she told Insider.

There are roles that push an actor to explore outside their comfort zone, and there are roles that ask the actor to get downright creative. Starring in "Anne Rice's Mayfair Witches" demanded Alexandra Daddario do both.

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Daddario plays a gifted neurosurgeon whose life is upended when she traces her blood ties back to the Mayfair family in New Orleans.

There, she discovers that not only is she the family heir in a centuries-old line of bonafide witches, but being the heir comes with serious baggage. That includes inheriting an evil spirit named Lasher who bonds with the Mayfair family heir of every generation, demanding their love and devotion in a twisted relationship that defies logic.

If it all sounds slightly convoluted, that's because it is. Rice's penchant for intricate (and at times, tawdry) supernatural dramas typically plumbed the depths of despair and peaks of ecstasy throughout her sprawling novels.

To identify with her character, Daddario tried to ground everything in her character's journey — no matter how paranormal — in the human experience, which included falling under Lasher's spell.

"It's this very sort of intense, toxic kind of thing that has a lot of pleasure in it for some reason, so I just tried to relate it to something real," Daddario told Insider at the show's premiere in December.

She added: "When you have these big complex things like a demon ghost, or sort of stalker, what does that look like? I tried to approach it like it's a relationship with the boyfriend you shouldn't go back to, but you can't help that."

Daddario, who had never read Rice's work before "Mayfair Witches," also prepared for her role by studying "The Witching Hour," the first novel from Rice's Mayfair Witches saga, and poring over articles and interviews about Rice.

"I really tried to figure out who she was, what she was trying to say, who these people were, what the story was she was trying to tell, and where it came from," Daddario said. "So I did a lot of that to really dive into who this person was, what her struggles were, and the greater themes about humanity."

Her character's journey through much of season one means dealing with familial deaths and navigating her new, dysfunctional family in New Orleans. It was an arc that proved taxing for Daddario.

"The character is going through a lot," she acknowledged. "When you cry all day or — we all shot in New Orleans where it's very hot — when you are going to have a character that's going through all of that, and then you also get home, it's a lot."

But as far-flung as the show's story may be, Daddario contended her character's messiness will have some viewers relating to her.

"There's something very relatable about a woman who really has a lot of her stuff together but is also a mess," she added. "I've always felt when I'm in that place, you sort of feel, well how is this possible? Am I faking everything? I think it's a really, really relatable story as far as you can be both — together and a mess — at the same time and work through things."

Spellbinding 'Anne Rice's Mayfair Witches' trailer finds Alexandra Daddario confronting her powers

Alexandra Daddario's character learns all sorts of interesting things about her family history.

Do you remember when Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire first put a spell on you? Perhaps you've been a fan of Louis and Lestat since way back in 1976, and have remained nothing but satisfied, particularly with AMC's new series that just wrapped its first season. But of course, Rice created many other enchanting worlds, like in her 1990-1994 bestselling trilogy, the Lives of the Mayfair Witches, which is about to debut in live action as the next series in AMC's burgeoning "Anne Rice Immortal Universe."

If you're inclined to be so macabre-minded, behold the spellbinding new official trailer below for Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches, starring Alexandra Daddario (The White Lotus) as an astutely intuitive neurosurgeon who starts to learn some darkly illuminating family history, namely that she's the unlikely heir to a family of witches. So yeah, that'll take some getting used to.

CHECK IT OUT:

"An exploration of female power and the mortal implications of our decisions," the 8-episode series focuses on Daddario's Dr. Rowan Fielding, who upon discovering such a unique family history, then has to get used to not just the idea of being a witch, but also the vast power that comes with it. And there's also a "sinister presence that has haunted her family for generations," per the synopsis. Oh, and she also may be the pinnacle power of her witchy line.

At this summer's AMC Television Critics Association virtual press tour panel for the series, AMC's Anne Rice universe executive producer, Mark Johnson, told reporters (including SYFY WIRE) that while the two series will only be tangentially connected in their first seasons, there are some nods to Interview with the Vampire: "Some are fun, some are deliberate, and some are almost Easter eggs."

But Johnson made it clear that Mayfair Witches -- co-starring Harry Hamlin (Cortland Mayfair), Tongayi Chirisa (Ciprien Grieve), and Jack Huston (Lasher) -- "is very much its own project and its own series."

You can see what he means Jan. 8, 2023, when Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches debuts on AMC+ and AMC.

Looking for something horrific to watch? Peacock has lots of horror movies to keep you suitably scared.

One common tradition is the lighting of bonfires, which symbolize the warmth and light of the sun. People gather around the fires to celebrate and sing songs, and the fires are often used to perform rituals or ceremonies. The bonfires are also seen as a way to drive away evil spirits and ensure a bountiful harvest in the coming year.

Another tradition is the decorating of homes and altars with evergreen branches, holly, and other symbols of life and fertility. The evergreen branches are used to represent the continuation of life, even in the midst of winter. Many people also exchange gifts during the solstice, as a way of sharing abundance and good fortune. In addition to these traditions, pagans often participate in rituals and ceremonies that are specific to their individual beliefs and practices. These may include meditations, prayers, and offerings to deities or spirits associated with the solstice. Some people also choose to perform acts of charity or service during this time, as a way of giving back and expressing gratitude. Overall, solstice pagan traditions are a way for people to connect with the cycles of nature and celebrate the changing seasons. They provide a sense of meaning and purpose, and can be a source of comfort and joy in an often chaotic and busy world. Whether celebrated in a small gathering or a larger community, solstice pagan traditions offer a way for people to come together and honor the natural world around them..

Reviews for "Solstice Divination: Ancient Practices for Modern Pagans"

1. John - 2 stars - I was really disappointed in "Solstixe pagan traditions". I was expecting a deep exploration of pagan traditions and rituals, but instead, I found a shallow and superficial overview. The book lacked substance and depth, and it felt more like a commercialized attempt to cash in on the growing interest in paganism rather than a genuine attempt to educate and inform. I would not recommend this book to anyone looking for a serious and comprehensive guide to pagan traditions.

2. Sarah - 1 star - I found "Solstixe pagan traditions" to be incredibly misleading. The title led me to believe that this book would delve into the rich history and practices of various pagan traditions, but instead, it was filled with vague and generic information that I could have easily found with a quick internet search. The author's lack of expertise and research was evident throughout the book, and I felt like I wasted my time reading it. If you're looking for a genuinely informative book on pagan traditions, look elsewhere.

3. Mark - 2 stars - As someone who has been practicing paganism for several years, I found "Solstixe pagan traditions" to be a disappointment. The book barely scratched the surface of pagan practices and failed to provide any meaningful insights or guidance. The author seemed more focused on sensationalism and promoting their own beliefs rather than offering a balanced and comprehensive view of paganism. I would not recommend this book to anyone serious about exploring pagan traditions.

4. Emily - 1 star - "Solstixe pagan traditions" was a complete waste of my time. The book lacked structure and coherence, making it difficult to follow and understand. The information provided was scattered and incomplete, and the author seemed more interested in sharing their personal experiences rather than providing factual and informative content. I was left feeling frustrated and unsatisfied with this book, and I would not recommend it to anyone interested in learning about pagan traditions.

5. David - 2 stars - I had high hopes for "Solstixe pagan traditions", but unfortunately, it fell short of my expectations. The book lacked depth and failed to provide any meaningful insights into pagan traditions. The content felt repetitive and the author's writing style was unengaging. Overall, I found this book to be unremarkable and would not recommend it to anyone seeking a comprehensive understanding of pagan practices.

Sacred Sites and Solstice Celebrations in Pagan Traditions