Hey, Uncle Roger,

Maybe the organizers of this upcoming Charlie’s Angels 50th Anniversary Celebration will come up with something especially creative and exciting for the assembled Charlie’s Angels fans there to enjoy, like:

“Diva Vodka with Sabrina, Kelly and Kris!”  (Or Diva Vodka with Kate, Jaclyn and Cheryl, if you prefer.)

F/Y/I: Diva Vodka goes for “only” one-million dollars per bottle. (I wonder, then, what a glass of the stuff goes for?) 🤔🍸💴💰💵🤑🤑🤑😲?

Hi, Scott,

I think that’s great that you wanted to make a DS reunion film, entitled “Darker Shadows” back during the 1980s. No doubt, the millions of DS fans would have loved to have seen what was going on in Collinsport and how the lives of the DS characters had changed after more than ten years. The closest we got to find out about what had happened to Barnabas, Willie, Dr. Hoffman, Angelique and the rest of those fascinating characters was when the late Sam Hall wrote a follow-up on the goings-on at Collinwood after DS went off the air in April of 1971 in an article published in October of that same year. The piece was entitled, “Here’s What Really Happened to Barnabas & Company.” The late Marcy Robin very kindly mailed me a copy of that article many years ago.

As best as I can recall, Barnabas and Julia did finally get together and marry. However, I think that Roger had discovered that Barnabas was a vampire and almost succeeded in staking him in his coffin, but was stopped by Angelique, who then “sent” Roger to “rest” permanently with his ancestors in the Collins Mausoleum at The Eagle Hill Cemetery. Another tragedy occurred when Chris Jennings, who had previously left town with his fiancée Sebrina Stewart and Chris’s young sister, Amy while Barnabas and Julia had been over in PT Collinsport, escaped from the locked room Sebrina had confined him in and Chris killed her. When Chris discovered the next day that he had murdered Sebrina, he took his own life.

With no one to care for Amy, Carolyn brought her back to Collinwood and assumed responsibility for the young girl. Oh, yeah, after years of complaining about how “difficult” and “unfulfilling” her life was, Carolyn finally got off her pretty, little keester and after obtaining her undergraduate degree, Carolyn began a career (and actually got a job!) as a psychic researcher with Professor Stokes acting as her advisor and fellow colleague.

You know, it’s been wonderful to have been able to discuss DS in all of its incarnations with so many great fans/cousins here on the Dark Shadows Forums over the past twenty-five-plus years. We’ve discussed so many topics regarding DS, from the over 1000 episodes that were filmed during the original series, peoples’s favorite characters on the show and what might have happened after Barnabas, Julia and Professor Stokes returned from their journey to 1840. In addition, we’ve discussed topics and issues from the “real world,” that took place over the past quarter-century. I will always remember the deep and serious discussions we had on this site following the terrorist attacks on our country on September 11, 2001. For those of us, who lived near New York City, those discussions were especially meaningful. I recall reading the thoughtful comments of Cassandra, who lives in nearby White Plains, NY, JoeyTrom who is from Brooklyn and the late, lamented Raineypark, who lived on Long Island. And, I could see the twin towers burn and collapse from across the Hudson River in New Jersey. It was a terrible day which profoundly changed life for us in America.

Another aspect of DS fandom has been the DS Festivals, which many fans have attended over the years. I read that you attended several DS Festivals out in California. I attended several of the festivals in New York City and enjoyed them very much back then during the 1980s and 1990s. Unfortunately, over the past forty years, many of the DS actors have died. And, the “DS kiddies” (as the late, great Louis Edmonds once nicknamed us) are now sexagenarians, with many soon to be venerable septuagenarians. We’ve all aged and many of us now have varying degrees of difficulty in getting around. In addition, as mostly, now-retired individuals, we just don’t have the disposable income available to spend on activities like vacations, concerts and fan get-togethers that we did while we were working. This relates to why I think that it’s time for the DS Festivals to come to an end.

Back in October of 2023, Kathryn Leigh Scott held a DS meet and greet event at the Lyndhurst estate. The admission fee for this event was a very reasonable $30.00. In addition, Ms. Scott had her assortment of books and photographs for sale at the event. And, having this event in October meant that the weather would be cool and relatively comfortable for the DS fans of “a certain age,” who were there, walking around the estate. Ironically, Lara Parker died on October 12, 2023, about a week before KLS’s meet and greet event at Lyndhurst. Ms. Parker’s death must have brought a somber tone to that event.

Then in July of 2025, KLS held another DS event at the Lyndhurst estate. Now, the weather in July along the Hudson River there in Tarrytown, NY can be very warm, hardly suitable weather for aging DS fans to be wandering about the hilly Lyndhurst estate. However, what I especially found to be “problematic” were the fees that Ms. Scott was charging at l this event: a $40.00 admission fee, $125.00 for something called “Champagne at Collinwood” and $82.75 for the opportunity to have your photograph taken in a 19th century tintype-style shot. What was the need to charge the fans for these other expensive “attractions” since Ms. Scott had kept the cost to attend her October 2023 DS event at Lyndhurst very affordable, especially for older DS fans who now have to carefully budget their expenditures? Are the property taxes at Ms. Scott’s new home at Croton-on-Hudson so expensive that she had to charge so much more to attend that July event?

When I first commented on this July DS event several months ago, there were other longtime DS posters, such as Gerard, Annie and Uncle Roger, who also thought that the fees being charged for this July, 2025 DS event were exorbitant and after forty years, that it was time to end these DS events. But, of course, there will always be those individuals, who will rush like blithely enthusiastic lemmings to these events. No price is too great, I guess?

Take care,

Bob

Now that you mention it, Bob, I so remember that. As I recall, I don't think that anyone was especially surprised or disappointed

Uncle Roger,

I do recall that some fans were disappointed that Ms. McKecknie cancelled her appearance at that DS event at the last minute and expressed their annoyance here, especially after she got on a social media site and she just had to share the “exciting” news that she had instead attended the opening of some Broadway show over that same weekend.

 Did Ms. McKechnie really think that everyone would get a vicarious “thrill,” upon hearing about her “wonderful”
evening at the theater? Somehow, I don’t think so. 

At $500.00 a ticket, maybe the event’s organizers will offer a glass of expensive wine to attract potential attendees with something like, “Dom Perignon Vintage 2008 at Collinwood!”? 

Do you think that such noted Collinsport penny-pinchers as Sarah Johnson, Mordecai Grimes and Judith Collins-Trask would shell out the five bills to attend this upcoming event at the Jay Gould estate? 

  Two bathrooms. 

That’s probably two more than Barnabas had in the Old House. 

Maybe Ms. Jackson can come up with some exciting and innovative idea for her many loyal fans like, for instance, “Champagne With One of Charlie’s Original Angels”? 👩🏻‍🦰😇

No doubt, many fans will positively rush to pay the $125.00 fee just to enjoy a glass of champagne with the beautiful and lovely Sabrina Duncan! 😍🍾🍸🤩