DARK SHADOWS FORUMS

General Discussions => Current Talk Archive => Current Talk '24 I => Current Talk '12 II => Topic started by: quentincollins on November 18, 2012, 06:51:39 AM

Title: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: quentincollins on November 18, 2012, 06:51:39 AM: I was wondering recently about the "private" sex lives of the characters on DS.
While I think it was obvious that Carolyn was sleeping with Buzz, do you guys think that she was sleeping with Joe when they were togather? What about Joe and Maggie? Vicky and Peter?
I think we pretty much know that Quentin slept with most of the women in 1897.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Uncle Roger on November 18, 2012, 06:57:13 AM: Carolyn appeared to have a pretty active sex life, although she was almost a nun compared to PT Angelique.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: quentincollins on November 18, 2012, 07:02:41 AM: PT Angelique seems to have slept with every man except probably Roger (who was probably gay) and Chris, who was a decent guy that probably wouldn't fool around with his cousin's wife.
Carolyn does seem like a good time girl, especially back in the early years. It seems likely that she and Joe were sleeping togather while they were dating. I also think that Adam raped Carolyn the day that she asked Prof Stokes to take Adam. A scene ends with him grappling with her and the next scene she's upset and disheveled. Carolyn does seem to get less promiscuous and more serious over time. I'm thinking that she probably didn't sleep with Chris, and probably no one else until Jeb.
I'm not sure what I think was going on with Burke, Vicky and Carolyn.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Uncle Roger on November 18, 2012, 08:07:52 AM: As the series went on, Carolyn seemed to mature quite a bit. She's taken a job and doesn't seem to be getting hammered at the Blue Whale every night.

I think that she definitely wanted to sleep with Burke. And I don't think that he was above using her to get what he wanted. When Burke and Vicki got serious, Carolyn just moved on.

Laura Collins, in both her incarnations, appeared to be quite active as well. The contemporary Laura was seeing both Roger and Burke at the same time and it was implied more than once that Burke was David's real father. And the 1897 Laura cheated on Edward with Quentin.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 18, 2012, 01:10:08 PM: given the outrageousness of the plots the show was rather traditional in it's attitudes about sex. i doubt the word itself was even uttered once in five years.

things were coded for the viewer.

no matter how late at night julia was working at the old house there was almost always a scene where she puts on her coat and returns to collinwood. why? because at the time it would not have been "proper" for an unmarried lady to spend the night in a house with two men. or even to leave the impression of it to the other characters in the series. for the sake of "propriety", to keep julia a "respectable" woman(even while she created artificial men out of dead bodies in the basement),it was essential that she remain at collinwood as the guest of elizabeth. things like that still mattered then.

whenever the plot necessitated that joe spend the night at the evans' cottage, they make a big deal of joe announcing that he'd just "stretch out on the couch", least the viewer get the impression he had slept in maggie's room. and then we see him there in the morning. maggie wasn't "that kind of girl". when vicki needed a place for jeff to stay she asked maggie if he could stay at her house, essentially a two room shack, rather than him staying in a forty room mansion. again, it wouldn't have been "proper" for the two characters, then unmarried, to live under the same roof. and vicki was nothing if not virtuous with a capital V.

in the DS universe extramarital sex was synonymous with vice and wickedness. so while the nasty characters like laura and quentin and angelique could hop from bed to bed(and even that was largely implied rather than spelled out in specifics)the "good" characters remained chaste outside the marriage bed. although the characters could have huge moral conflictions about other issues, sex was generally not one of them. things were pretty black and white.

even as attitudes about sex changed dramatically in the late 1960's an afternoon soap, sponsored by manufacturers of breakfast cereal and laundry detergent and marketed at housewives and adolescents, needed to maintain a traditional attitude in this regard.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Gothick on November 18, 2012, 03:24:13 PM: michael, the kind of thing you mention was, from what I have been able to figure out over the years, largely controlled not by the writers or producers, but by an office at the network that, if memory serves, bore the name "Standards and Practices."

I've just pulled out my copy of a book entitled "Dark Shadows: the introduction of Barnabas," a fan publication from 1988. I was fortunate enough to be able to secure a copy when I first found the organized fandom in the early 1990s. (I may even have purchased it at New York's Forbidden Planet!) On p. 132 there is a photostat (for you youngsters, that's sort of like a scan) of a memo headed ABC Dept. of Broadcast Standards and Practices, Eastern Division--New York. I don't have the energy to type out the entire text, but the memo seems to imply that the script AND videotape for every episode of DS had to pass review by this office--essentially, an internal censorship board the network ran. The photostat gives approval, with the proviso that corrections or suggestions as outlined be adopted, for the script, and mentions a screening report that would be issued once "the finished film" had been submitted for review. (I frankly doubt whether the office had time to screen every episode of DS before it went out for broadcast, particularly on weeks when the schedule got tight between taping and broadcast, but who knows.)

This memo contains the often-quoted notation: "Please ensure that Jason's wisecracks [to Willie, in a scene at the Old House] about 'light housekeeping' and 'the lady of the house,' as addressed to Willie are delivered so that there is no insinuation that Jason suspects a sexual relationship between Willie and Barnabas." (One wonders if they were aware that many fans have seen the whole Jason/Willie thing as a thinly veiled sexual "friendship" with what appear to be bondage undertones!)

You can really tell that things have changed with what they were allowed to get away with, with the Yeagar character's Maggie obsession in 1970 and how Yeagar "expressed" it onscreen, and then the most dramatic change of all, when [spoiler]characters played by Jonathan Frid and Lara Parker actually went to bed almost in camera view, in circumstances that imply a rape (or at least some heavy coercion), in the PT1841 sequence.[/spoiler] I don't know what the status of script review by the S&P office was at that point.

All this notwithstanding, speculation about hanky-panky between various characters is a lot of fun, and I'm enjoying this thread. I also love it in 1970 when Carolyn informs anyone who cares to listen that "hypocrisy above all is the Collins family motto"--a great moment, in a GREAT storyline *wink*.

Cheers,

GothEEK
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 18, 2012, 03:59:48 PM: in the context of the series there was one early scene that i recall actually finding quite "shocking"...

during the burke/carolyn flirtation there was an episode where carolyn goes to burke's room at the inn for one of their ill-fated "dates". carolyn reclines on the couch and at one point actually takes off her shoes.

up to this point i had accepted her as a hair tossing coquette expressing her rebellion by gyrating at the blue whale. but here she seemed crude and even slatternly.

of course in a contemporary context this scene would actually play as rather tame but given the perimeters the series had set for itself thus far i was shocked. [hall2_shocked]
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: David on November 18, 2012, 04:29:27 PM: Barnabas & Angelique doing the deed in Martinique prior to 1795 was hardly implied.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 18, 2012, 04:36:29 PM: no.

but it was the cause of barnabas' downfall.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: DarkLady on November 18, 2012, 06:56:51 PM: Gothick, thanks for the quote from Standards and Practices--what a hoot! Those things would seem very tame nowadays.

Quote from: Gothick on November 18, 2012, 03:24:13 PM
[spoiler]characters played by Jonathan Frid and Lara Parker actually went to bed almost in camera view, in circumstances that imply a rape (or at least some heavy coercion), in the PT1841 sequence.[/spoiler]

Interesting, but I seriously doubt [spoiler]whether any coercion at all was necessary. Bramwell did want to keep Catherine prisoner, but I never thought he would actually harm her, because it would give her more grounds for rejecting him.[/spoiler]

Anyhow, all this speculation is great fun, especially when we know, for instance, [spoiler]just how unfaithful PT Angelique was, and how "our" Quentin slept with probably every woman in Collinsport.[/spoiler]
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: quentincollins on November 18, 2012, 08:21:35 PM: I think Carolyn was fooling around with Joe, and obviously with Buzz. She was also almost certainly raped by Adam. I don't think there was anyone else she was intimate with until Jeb,and then at least thru the tv series, no one else after him.
I wonder about Joe and Maggie. Did we ever see him sleep on the couch after Sam died? Just because Joe slept on the couch while Sam was around, doesn't mean that Joe and Maggie weren't fooling around in the back of Joe's car on some deserted road. I know that Maggie was a good girl, but she was also a young adult and deeply in love. I don't think there was anyone else on the show she was with though.
I'd think Vicky would be virginal, except for the way Jeff and Vicky went at it like junkyard dogs in heat in their many kissing scenes. Restraint wasn't really the vibe they were giving off.
It was pretty obvious that Peter was having sex with Danielle Roget before he met vicky.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: quentincollins on November 18, 2012, 08:35:44 PM: Laura was clearly sleeping with Burke before she hooked up with Roger. I always thought Roger was more interested in Burke than Laura, and only wanted her out of spite, since he couldn't have Burke, he'd take the woman Burke wanted to hurt him. I find it hard to imagine Angelique actually consummated her marriage to Roger, and prefer to think she just kept him enchanted to think they were having sex.
Angelique and Barnabas had their legendary nights on Martinique. I've heard specualtion that they were sleeping togather by the end of 1840. I'm not so sure of that, but I think it's possible. Angelique also seemed to be happy with Sky until Barnabas came back into her life. Was it implied that Miranda and Judah were lovers, or is that just my overactive imagination?
I do think it's funny how with all the crazy hours Julia spends at the Old House and the way Barnabas and Julia were always whispering togather everyone had to assume they were having a wild affair.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 18, 2012, 10:16:48 PM: hypothesising about whether or not joe and maggie fooled around in the car is just fan fiction. it was never actually written into the scripts so one can speculate about such things into perpetuity to no resolve.

since these are completely fictitious people none of them "really" slept together. but the series was carefully written and structured to let the viewer know who was who and what was what. ingenue characters like vicki and maggie were very carefully written so that their premarital "purity" remained intact. carolyn was certainly more morally ambiguous but even with that we never actually saw her in bed with anyone until she and jeb were married. not a minute before. all of that was calculation on the part of the writers and producers and, as gothick mentioned, ABC standards and practices department. none of it was by chance.

perhaps because the whole thing was so outrageous in every other aspect to keep it from tipping the scales into a caligulan orgy a sense of sexual propriety was always kept in place.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: quentincollins on November 18, 2012, 10:41:19 PM: That's really the point of the whole thread. Speculation, and also to gather our collective knowledge for what information we have. If someone could point out an episode after Sam died where Joe is still seen to be chastely sleeping on the couch, then that would be evidence against a sexual relationship between Joe and Maggie.
For example, I think there is a pretty strong argument to be made for virginity with Vicky and Maggie.
I think it's pretty open as to how far Joe and Carolyn ever went, but I think it was pretty obvious that Carolyn was having sex with Buzz, and surely Peter was sleeping with Danielle pre-1795. Quentin in 1897 had cheated on his wife with his brother's wife, and surely everyone assumes that he and Beth were sleeping togather during 1897.
I do like the idea that show was at risk for "tipping the scales into a caligulan orgy".
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Gothick on November 18, 2012, 10:53:16 PM: Wow, I'd love to see a caligulan orgy in the drawing room. What a hoot! It would be interesting to see just what would happen to some of the ladies' elaborate hairpieces. It's shown a number of times that the women who live at Collinwood go to bed wearing their high heels.

Dark Lady, alas I can't read the part of your post where you are responding to me. I don't know if it's because I'm on a Mac or just what, but the whole text is blocked out in white and clicking or highlighting on it doesn't help.

G.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Uncle Roger on November 18, 2012, 10:54:39 PM: Bramwell and Catherine [spoiler]definitely got it on, at least once. And of course Catherine ends up pregnant.[/spoiler] Which, as I recall, is exactly what my parents said would happen.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 19, 2012, 12:09:29 AM: you're right quentincollins...

i think we were just trying to make two different points.

carry on.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Midnite on November 19, 2012, 12:32:20 AM: Quote from: Gothick on November 18, 2012, 10:53:16 PM
Dark Lady, alas I can't read the part of your post where you are responding to me. I don't know if it's because I'm on a Mac or just what, but the whole text is blocked out in white and clicking or highlighting on it doesn't help.

It's fixed now.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: DarkLady on November 19, 2012, 01:00:06 AM: (edited by admin)
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Midnite on November 19, 2012, 04:49:39 AM: DarkLady, please read the post above yours.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Gothick on November 19, 2012, 02:47:42 PM: Thanks, Midnite!

hugs, Gothy
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Mysterious Benefactor on November 19, 2012, 05:58:56 PM: And BTW, everything works the same on a MAC as it does on a PC, so no one should ever have to worry about that. [hall2_smiley]

As for sex on the show, with the exception of Laura/Burke, Barnabas/Angelique, PTAng and almost the entire male population of PTCollinsport, Yeager/Buffie, Carolyn/Jeb, Bramwell/Catherine, and of course RTQuentin and half of the world's female population, which are all situations where we know there were sexual relationships because the storylines pretty much confirm it, and with the exception of the married couples that have children (though I still say David was a product of the first experimental/successful in vitro-fertilization because Roger was too in love with himself to have sex with someone else), all the other sex is pretty much up to interpretation. Fans can present scenarios either for or against it, but there's really no way to prove either camp is completely right. And debating whether they did or didn't can be one of the more fun offshoots of watching the show. [hall2_grin]
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: David on November 19, 2012, 07:02:41 PM: You know that Philip & Megan Todd made beautiful love!
As did Angelique and Sky until things fell apart.

And I'm SURE that Jason was Willie's leather Daddy.
I've always suspected that Prof Stokes was gay--who might he have been with?
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: quentincollins on November 19, 2012, 11:29:13 PM: I always kind of thought that Prof Stokes had a hot nasty affair going with Adam. That vibe is kind of all over them imo.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Uncle Roger on November 20, 2012, 12:25:45 AM: Gerard and Leticia gave off a certain vibe that made me think that they had a past relationship. And, if this had been more of a traditional soap, David and Hallie would probably still be sneaking off to the west wing to indulge raging hormones.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: tragic bat on November 20, 2012, 01:57:42 AM: I thought it was hilarious how Maggie called up Joe in the middle of the night to came stay with her, and then had him sleep on the couch! In one instance, he burst into the bedroom in a fury of passion, [spoiler]only it was Jeff Clark's bedroom, and the two sexually repressed young men wrestled around together before talking about their "dreams." [/spoiler] Strangely, even when Jeff had moved out and supposedly there was thus a spare bedroom, Joe still slept on the couch.
[spoiler]
Perhaps Joe and Angelique or Barnabas and Charity didn't actually have traditional sex, but they took their vampiric laison to such an erotic place that it might as well have been. [/spoiler]
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: quentincollins on November 20, 2012, 04:01:16 AM: I think I do remember Joe using the couch even after we knew there was an empty bedroom. That may be the evidence I was looking for that supports the theory that Maggie wasn't sleeping with Joe after all.
It is true that the vampire attacks were sexual in nature, and that's an important point. While actual "normal" sex was rare on the show, the show was actually very sensual in it's own offbeat way.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 20, 2012, 04:16:38 AM: i just really don't think that in 1968 the network would have permitted any of the young, female characters who were cast in the series' "heroine" roles(ie. not witches, vamps or tramps)to engage, or to even give the impression of engaging, in premarital sex.

not just yet. maybe by the early 1970's it would have been conceivable but not yet.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: quentincollins on November 21, 2012, 02:08:32 AM: Beth was definitely implied to be having sex with Quentin I think. I guess she wasn't in the same ingenue catagory?
Were all soaps this demure and prudish about sex in the 60s? Weren't unplanned pregnancies fairly routine even then? I've recently been watching some mid 60s episodes of Days of Our Lives, and the big story at the time had Julie's boyfriend impregnating and then marrying another girl Susan (who seems to be the good girl with Julie as the bad girl as far as I can tell), all the while promising her that he'd divorce his wife and marry her as soon as the baby was born (which was planned to be given up for adoption, and the wedded couple can't stand each other and the marriage is in name only to give the baby a name). It is interesting to see how different things are, and how repressive the "morals" and "values" were, that this poor girl is marrying a guy she doesn't even like to legimitise a baby she's giving up for adoption anyways.
Sorry if that gets a little off topic, but I found it intersting to compare DS to a more traditionsal soap of the same era.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 21, 2012, 02:34:20 AM: personally, no, i do not consider beth to be in the same "ingenue" category on the series as vicki and maggie who at various points in the series served as it's heroine and "moral center".

my opinion of it is that the writers went out of their way to write the two characters as "virtuous". especially vicki. but again it's just an opinion since none of it is "real".

do you want them to be sexually active for some reason? i'm not seeing your point on this. maybe they were. who knows.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: quentincollins on November 21, 2012, 02:43:47 AM: The only point is just to speculate on things going on in the show, possible subtext, and a greater understanding of the characters. It's actually a big topic that I've never seen discussed much.
I do agree that the show went to great pains to portray Maggie and Vicki as "virtuous" and thus virginal, but from a modern point of view we can see more options. It wouldn't be unrealistic to think that Maggie and Joe, or Vicki and Jeff had a sexual relationship, even if the series didn't show it.
It is interesting to examine how Carolyn is portrayed in the early years as being less pure. It's hinted pretty broadly that she was getting high and sleeping with Buzz for example. Of course it's a standard stereotype that the "good" heroines like Maggie and Vicki were virginal, yet there are characters like Carolyn and Beth who were more sexualy liberated even if they are a little more complex in their morality.
I think it's worth noting that the flashbacks may have been more "loose" in their portrayal of sexuality.
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Gerard on November 21, 2012, 03:42:07 AM: As I use to think about my parents, no one in Dark Shadows would ever do that!

Gerard
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Bob_the_Bartender on November 22, 2012, 02:54:08 PM: Timeless and Impassioned, Great Lovers of the Ages:

Caesar & Cleopatra, Richard Burton & Elizabeth Taylor, Robert Wagner & Natalie Wood, Bill & Hillary (Rodham) Clinton, and, of course:

Dr. Eric Lang & Erica Fitz!!! [hall2_kiss] [hall2_rolleyes] [hall2_shocked] [hall2_grin] [hall2_wink]

Honorable mention:

Barnabas Collins & Josette Du Pre + Maggie Evans + Roxanne Drew + Julia Hoffman (?)

Joe Haskell & Maggie Evans

Carolyn Stoddard (Hawkes) & Joe Haskell + Burke Devlin + Tony Petersen + Chris Jennings + Jeb Hawkes + Sebastion Shaw

Willie Loomis & Roxanne

Angelique Bouchard (Collins/Rumson) & Barnabas Collins + Roger Collins + Quentin Collins + Sky Rumson

Aristede & himself!

Laura Collins & Edward Collins + Roger Collins + Burke Devlin

The Eagle Hill Cemetery Caretaker + Donna Friedlander

PT 1970 Angelique (Stokes) Collins & Quentin Collins + Bruno Hess + Mr. Trask + That Murdered Guy in the Really Bad Leisure Suit + Will Loomis + Fred, the handyman + Steve, the dockworker + Horace Gladstone + Ms. Julia Hoffman (?) + 99% of the remainder of the male population of Collinsport, Maine!!! [hall2_kiss] [hall2_kiss] [hall2_kiss] [hall2_shocked] [hall2_wink]
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 22, 2012, 03:00:20 PM: indeed parallel time ang was quite the floozy, wasn't she?

inspiring endless unrequited love.

don't forget *roger* although i think we can read a different subtext into that relationship. [hall2_wink]
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Mysterious Benefactor on November 22, 2012, 04:45:49 PM: Quote from: Bob_the_Bartender on November 22, 2012, 02:54:08 PM
That Murdered Guy in the Really Bad Leisure Suit

How could anyone forget the name of Dameon Edwards?!

(http://www.dsboards.com/SMF/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=22644.0;attach=30799)

[hall2_grin]
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 22, 2012, 05:08:12 PM: yes the dameon edwards subplot...

otherwise known as how-to-kill-a-week-or-two-of-episodes-while-your-main-cast-is-filming-a-movie storytelling.

utterly, completely forgettable. [hall2_rolleyes]
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Bob_the_Bartender on November 23, 2012, 12:52:31 PM: Quote from: michael c on November 22, 2012, 03:00:20 PM
don't forget *roger* although i think we can read a different subtext into that relationship. [hall2_wink]

Hey, michael c,

Yes, PT Roger Collins had "other" interests, primarily in "John Barleycorn," as I recall. That other Roger was sort of Dark Shadows' own "answer" to Dean Martin, imo. [beer] And I don't want to say that PT Roger Collins drank to excess, but he made Real Time Roger Collins and Sam Evans seem like confirmed teetotalers by comparison. [angel5] [angel7] [hall2_wink]

Oh yeah, I meant to cite Dr. Eric Lang and Leona Eltridge (a/k/a Danielle Roget) as two of the world's great, impassioned lovers. Actress Erica Fitz (who portrayed Ms. Eltridge) was such an unforgettable and decidedly zaftig and voluptuous lady, that she left an indelible "impression" on a certain young boy over forty-four years ago! [love7] [tongue3] [devil]

Mysterious Benefactor,

Yes, how could I forget the name of Dameon Edwards, the murdered guy in that really bad leisure suit!?! [hall2_shocked] Hey, I wonder if Dameon purchased his "stylish" leisure suits at the exact same store where the late talk show host Tom Snyder, rock impresario Don Kirshner and actor Anson "Potsie Weber" Williams used to buy theirs? [hall2_undecided] [hall2_cool] [hall2_cheesy]

Bob

PS Two other "Great, Impassioned Lovers for the Ages":

The Rev. Gregory Trask & Minerva Trask - The Ashton Kutcher & Mila Kunis of Dark Shadows! [9341]
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: Gerard on November 23, 2012, 08:11:20 PM: Quote from: Mysterious Benefactor on November 22, 2012, 04:45:49 PM
How could anyone forget the name of Dameon Edwards?!

If PTAngelique did it with him, it obviously was a pitty date.

Gerard
Title: Re: Sex in the Shadows
Post by: michael c on November 24, 2012, 01:25:43 PM: i'm just watching 1841 parallel time for the first time and last night watched an episode i found quite striking in terms of this discussion. i believe it's already been mentioned...

[spoiler]it has a scene where it is very strongly implied that bramwell and catherine have just made love. catherine is lying on a bed in what appears to be a post-coital state as bramwell is redressing.[/spoiler]

it's all implied. nothing is spelled out in specifics for the viewer right then and there but i found it remarkable in it's sexual frankness given the times and the perimeters the series had set for itself in this regard. since this was 1971 perhaps network attitudes about such things were becoming more progressive than they had been earlier in the series' run. also it's worth noting that these were "parallel time" characters. not the "real" present time characters viewers had come to know. i wonder if the writers felt that they could be more permissive, more open, with the possibility of these characters and their sexuality. they really had nothing to "lose" so to speak. it was a subtle but slightly shocking scene.