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« on: November 29, 2012, 08:27:00 AM »
Oops! I didn't mean to violate any rules by posting the image from the ebay site.
I just went ahead and typed out the part of Anthony's comments about Dark Shadows just in case the image gets removed from ebay.
Anthony George: I did the original Dark Shadows. I was the romantic lead in that. I hated it. I
couldn't have hated anything more. And they, to this day, have these festivals
and they keep sending me these booklets: Please write down certain things. And
I've never responded.
When they asked me to do it, I had done the national company of Funny Girl and Jule Stein
told me that he had composed a musical called Hallelujah Baby and wanted me to audition for
it. And he said, "You know, you really should be in New York because you'd be
very good for a lot of leading man things for musicals." So I moved to New York
and was sort of talked into doing Dark Shadows.
Dan Curtis asked me to replace Mitch Ryan and I said, "Well, I don't want to
do a soap opera but I'll tell you what; I would love to learn to direct these, and
if you'll let me direct eventually, I will play the part."
He said, "Fine, okay," so I did a bunch of them and I kept going to him and say-
ing, "When are you gonna let me go into the control room and learn? When am I
gonna participate?" And he started making excuses like,
"Uh, you don't want to work with four cameras and all those cables and all
that." So I got a little angry. I'd never signed a contract. While I was
there I got called by the producers of another production of Funny Girl to come to
Disneyland to do it in a big theater in the round with Mimi Hines for two weeks.
So l went to Dan Curtis and I said, "I'm leaving for three weeks; l'm gonna do
Funny Girl. And he said, "You can't do that we'd have to change the whole story
line." I said, "Well, I haven't got a contract. You know, you have not let me
direct. And they're offering me a lot of money and I'm gonna go.
He said, "Well, when you come back l want a contract." So I sorta grinned and
left. And when I came back they had changed the story line: all of us were
playing our generations before, and they were all in these costumes.
And I remember, Joan Bennett couldn't remember lines. She would hire a man
for the whole weekend to help her with the lines for the next show. And when
she would get on camera she'd start to shake. And when it was over with she'd
say, "You know, I worked my butt off learning these lines and the moment it's
over I don't remember one line. I could never say them again." She says, "This is
agony for me to do this."
In any case, the experience was not a pleasant one for me. Just weeks later I
received another call. They asked me to do Funny Girl for six months at the Riv-
iera in Las Vegas, for quite a lot of money. And so, I went to the studio and first
of all I told Joan, "I'm gonna leave." And she said, "Oh my God! Why don't
you tell Dan in my dressing room!!!" I said no. So I called him up and said.
"I've got something to talk to you about. You wanna come to the set? And he
came up and he said, "Don't tell me." l said, "Yeah, I'm leaving. I'm gonna go
to Las Vegas. Would you turn that down? He said, "Yes, l would. You're
committed to this."
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