I just posted Chapter Seven!  It may shock some people with my theories, but this IS fiction- or is it?

I'll leave it for you to decide......

Once again we are united in sorrow over losing a beloved DS cast member.  This one is especially poignant considering how much promise Don had early on his career.  Here's a bit of info that may brighten things a bit: a few months ago I discovered at the Musuem of TV & Radio a 1966 Days of our Lives episode starring Don Briscoe!!  This is a B/W kinescope with Don playing the role of "Tony Merritt" . 

With "Days" now on SoapNet, I'm hoping that the network will be able to go deep in the Columbia Television tape vaults for vintage episodes dating back to show#1 from November 8, 1965.  And here's the main reason why ALL DS fans should be interested in this:  all of the "Days" episodes in the Columbia vaults are in color, including Don's!  I have heard that there are plans for SoapNet to spin-off a "Classic SoapNet" channel that would air vintage soaps from years gone by.  If it comes to pass, I think that Columbia would supply the early episodes of "Days". Y&R, and possibly B&B.  Of course, DS would be a must for this proposed channel.  Who knows, maybe within the next few years we can see Don's "Days" episodes rerun on TV, along with his work on DS!

OK- here's the lowdown on the actresses' hair.  For the first few episodes there was KLS in that dumb blond bubble cut wig, and Joan Bennett with the tarantula that was pasted on top of her head for nearly two years. (BTW, in an early interview Joan complained that she needed a new hairpiece!)  I was so happy when Joan FINALLY let her hair down in 1969- it was far more becoming.

As for Grayson, the pre-'68 Julia had that lousy wig that Curtis & company forced on her unitl Norma Curtis told Dan that Grayson looked much better with her own hair- so, the famous April'68 "haircut" was the result!  (And I hear that Norma's a redhead like Grayson!)  I always prefered Grayson's own tresses, and she looked fabulous in the later 1970 episodes and in HODS with the soft, upsept look.  To play Constance Collins in the 1680PT flashback (the Brutus story), hairstylist Edith Tilles added pieces to Grayson's hair for the elaborate 1680 'do Grayson had to wear.  Lastly, Edith pulled off a masterpiece with the wig she chose for Grayson in NODS- a glamourous pageboy that accented her face perfectly!

Lara Parker wore pieces for various "past" storylines, and it's a shame that Clarice Blackburn never got a chance to show off her red hair on DS, all of her characters wore dark wigs!!  Fortunately, she did get to wear her own hair in NODS... 

Lisa Richards had beautiful long hair offscreen, but except for the flashback sequence where "Sabrina" witnessed Chris' transformation into the wolf, she was forced to wear short, dark wigs!  Even for HODS they made her wear a wig as Daphne Budd! 

By and large, the 60s was notorious for the out-of-control use of wigs by women in all fields, especially the entertainment field.  The next time you see a vintage 1960s album cover by a pop diva like Dionne/Cher/Dusty/Aretha/Barbra/Petula and every lady who sang at Motown, take a good look at the hair- it's probably a wig!  The DS ladies were merely caught up in a crazy trend ........

BTW, according to Grayson herself, the wig she wore on Night Gallery was previously worn by another titian-haired goddess- Rita Hayworth!

Hi. Jenny!  Glad to see you enjoyed the sights & sounds of NYC, incuding The Naked Cowboy, who's quite a Times Square fixture!  I only hope that the next Festival will take place at a hotel that has direct access to more outside stores/restaurants!  I felt absolutely STUCK there- at least at the Manhattan and Brooklyn Marriotts there were places to go to on the outside to buy food cheaply instead of being charged an arm and a leg for lunch.  (Sorry, but I still can't get over having to pay $17.00 for a Reuben sandwich and a slice of cheesecake!  In Manhattan I could get that meal TWICE for the same price!)

I don't know about you, but from reading that article excerpt it only bolsters what I said earlier- Mr. Wallace merely created the characters and backstory for the pre-Barnabas storylines.  By April '67 he was long gone and it was up to the combined efforts of Curtis, Costello and the  staff writers (Sproat/Marmorstein) I quote verbatim from Ron Sproat's intro to The History of 'Dark Shadows' 1966-67:  "We outlined the next week (the "we" being Mal Marmorstein and me, Francis Swann having left the show), following the Laura story that Art Wallace had left behind (my emphasis- CE), and it just didn't work.....By roughly episode #180, it became obvious that Laura could not go on much longer, that we would need to find another character to equal, or if possible, top her.  Dan Curtis decided only one character would do to follow Laura- and that would be a vampire.  This led to a round of meetings, culminating in one marathon 41-hour meeting- but out of it, Barnabas Collins was born".

There you have it, from someone who really was there.  All Wallace did was create what was written in his bible "Shadows on the Wall".  Sproat and Marmorstein changed Wallace's original idea for the Laura storyline into the Phoenix storyline, and with Diana Millay about to have a baby, Laura had to go up in flames, and at Curtis' suggestion, the initial Barnabas story was created out of scratch with only a few pieces of the Wallace backstory shoehorned in- mainly, the idea that Josette Collins was Barnabas' long-lost love and he was the reason for her falling off Widows' Hill, and not beacuse she was unhappily married to Jeremiah as per Wallace's bible.    I think that settles the issue.  Mr. Wallace had a case of "sour grapes" over how the succeding writers changed his story and made "Dark Shadows" one of the most talked-about shows of the late 1960s.

So there.

Ms. Hu's casting is a step in the right direction.  As a person of color, this is long overdue!! Still, more needs to be done.  How about a black Sheriff Patterson or Eliot Stokes?