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Calendar Events / Announcements '16 II / Re: ShadowGram Update #382 -- 50th Anniversary updates; Marcy's message
« on: June 26, 2016, 01:02:43 AM »Wow, that would be fab if "The House" screening actually happens this time. I would love to see this included as an extra on one of MPI's releases.
Thanks to a post from '04, I see that the script for The House was presented live:
we prepared to watch the live dramatization of Art Wallace's Goodyear Theater teleplay The House, which had been billed all weekend as a pilot for the original DS.
The House was a real treat. I thought it was well-written and well-acted. The plot is essentially a condensed version of the Jason-Liz blackmail storyline. Set in 1910, it begins with an aging sailor named Jeb Calloway (John Karlen) complaining to a former shipmate, Walt Cummings (Jamison Selby) that nobody will hire him to sail because they believe he's too old. Walt suggests that Jeb find someone to stake (sponsor) him, and Jeb recalls a wealthy woman in his hometown of Collinsville called Caroline.
The scene shifts to Caroline Barnes, (Marie Wallace) who is teaching piano to young Jane Stoddard (Denise Nickerson) while Jane's mother Martha (Lara Parker) looks on. Caroline's daughter Elizabeth (KLS) is dating a nice young local boy, Larry, played by David Selby. (I believe I mistakenly referred to Selby's character as Frank elsewhere; I apologize for the confusion.) Larry wants to marry Liz, but she always puts him off with an excuse. For one thing, she doesn't want to leave her reclusive mother alone in the big old house, and she knows that Caroline will never leave the house to move in with her and Larry. In truth, Liz is reluctant to commit after seeing what marriage did to her mother. (This is the same problem that Carolyn experienced according to Wallace's Shadows on the Wall story bible.) Caroline's husband stole her jewelry 25 years ago, shortly after Liz was born, and left town. Since then, Caroline has never left the house; she is waiting for her husband to return. Jeb Calloway appears mysteriously, introducing himself as an old friend of Mr. Barnes (maybe his name was Frank.) Caroline is shocked and distraught to see him, but reluctantly agrees that Jeb can stay in her house while he is in town. Liz suspects that Jeb is really her father, returned under an alias. Instead of feeling happy though, she is afraid. In truth, Jeb is Caroline's accomplice. We are told that 25 years ago, Caroline accidentally shot and killed her husband when she discovered that he was trying to run away with the family fortune. Jeb, who had been waiting outside the house for his friend, heard the shot, discovered the body, and offered to bury it in the basement. Caroline gave him the jewels as payment with the understanding that she would never see Jeb again. However, he has now returned. With plenty of charm and sarcastic humor, Jeb intimidates Caroline, even disrupting her piano lessons, and hints that he would like to live in the house permanently as her husband. Caroline is anxious for Liz's sake. When Larry confronts her and accuses her of ruining Liz's life by living as a recluse and passing her own problems onto her commitment-shy daughter, (just as a drunken Joe did to Elizabeth on DS) Caroline makes a decision. She sends for the town constable (Jamison again) and tells him to dig in a particular area of the basement. She also tells Liz what really happened to her father. The constable informs Caroline that he found nothing in the basement. Jeb finally confesses that Caroline is no murderess; the bullet only grazed her husband and he soon regained consciousness. Jeb conned Caroline out of the jewels, the two men split the loot, and Barnes later died at sea. The constable is ready to press charges, but Caroline dissuades him. Though she is angry at Jeb for condemning her to 25 years of a private hell, she is relieved to learn of her innocence and happy to be able to leave the house at last.
I felt that Karlen stole the show with an Irish brogue patterned after Dennis Patrick's. Marie Wallace was also quite good as matriarch Caroline, and David Selby played Larry with an appealing boyishness. Jim Pierson had a small part as a bartender. Richard Halpern played the narrator and read stage directions. Details of The House, from character names to plot points, are very similar to those found in Shadows on the Wall and those that eventually found their way onto DS. It was a fun show and I was glad to have seen the genesis of DS. However, I did find it difficult to remember that in this story, Elizabeth is the daughter while Caroline is the mother. On DS, the name roles were reversed.