Happy Birthday, nicholasm79!

Janet Meehan was seated next to Lara with many paintings as well as her graphic novel on display.  Her work (seen via link) is much more stunning in person.

http://laraparkersite.blogspot.com/2016/10/talented-artist-illustrates-angeliques.html

**** SHADOWGRAM OFFICIAL DS NEWS ONLINE UPDATE #391: REPORTING DARK SHADOWS (DS) 50TH  ANNIVERSARY ENCORE:   
“HALLOWEEN IN HOLLYWOOD” OCT. 29-30
 
**** CELEBRATING DS IN 2017: THE DS NEW ENGLAND CRUISE
 
**** LARA PARKER – BOOK-SIGNING EVENT – SAT., NOV. 12
 
**** MORE TV, PRINT, & ONLINE SALUTES TO DS’ 50 YEARS & PUBLICATION OF LARA’S 4th DS NOVEL
 
SHADOWGRAM OFFICIAL DARK SHADOWS NEWS ONLINE UPDATE # 391
November 7, 2016
 
Hello, Dark Shadows Fan,
 
ShadowGram (SG), The Official Newsletter & News Source for Dark Shadows (DS), provides the following news in this ShadowGram Official Dark Shadows News Online Update "Bulletin."
 
**** SHADOWGRAM REPORTS:  DARK SHADOWS 50TH ANNIVERSARY ENCORE EVENT: “HALLOWEEN IN HOLLYWOOD”
 
Sat.-Sun., Oct. 29-30 2016
Woman's Club of Hollywood in Los Angeles, CA
 
On Sat., Oct. 29, more than 350 fans and 10 DS guests convened at the intimate and historic Woman’s Club of Hollywood in the heart of Hollywood, CA. Fans came from throughout California and Delaware, Missouri, South Dakota, New York, Minnesota, Arizona, Florida, New Jersey, Michigan, North Carolina, Virginia, Texas, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Massachusetts, Georgia, Nevada, and Maryland, plus Vancouver, BC, Canada (coming specifically just for this event).
 
A highlight was the premiere of Lara Parker's 4th DS novel "Dark Shadows: Heiress of Collinwood" before its official Nov. publication date. Together, everyone shared a full afternoon and evening of ongoing activities commemorating 5 decades of DS and its ongoing popularity among original, rediscovering, and newly-discovering fans of all ages.
 
Opening at noon, attendees were welcomed by SHADOWGRAM Newsletter editor Marcy Robin and Kathleen Resch, longtime editor of THE WORLD OF DARK SHADOWS fanzines: numerous DS fan novels and anthologies, and7 full-size illustrated DS Concordance Episode Guide books. Both of them – 2 of the co-founders of the DS Festivals (1983) – manned the registration table, which also offered special and popular DS merchandise for purchase: the retro-styled metal DS lunchbox, a variety of Big Finish Productions’ DS audio dramas on CD, and more. Kathy and Marcy also handled other responsibilities during the day.
 
Fans filled the large side room that was completely lined with tables where our DS guests greeted them, signed autographs, posed for photos, and offered pictures, books, and other items for sale. All day long, fans also settled in the airy auditorium to enjoy guest talks / presentations and to watch exclusive video screenings.
 
Guest onstage appearances highlighted the day. With regrets, Nancy Barrett, Mitchell Ryan, and Sy Tomashoff were unable to join us at the last minute.
 
First, John Karlen appeared after a half-hour video highlighted DS’ first year pre-Barnabas episodes. John shared stories about portraying “Willie Loomis” and other DS characters, plus acting experiences such as his Emmy Award-winning role on "Cagney & Lacey."
 
DS music composer Robert (Bob) Cobert, who celebrated his 92nd birthday earlier in the week, was a delightful speaker, candidly discussing his decades-long association with DS creator/executive producer Dan Curtis. He answered audience questions, chronicled his extensive career, and hummed some of his memorable DS music. He then sat down to chat with every fan who approached and to autograph the limited edition re-release of his original 1969 DS soundtrack album on commemorative purple vinyl, which was available at the event. Fans also had him sign their original 1969 albums, “Shadows of the Night” sheet music or vintage 45rpm records, and other pieces representing some of Bob’s many memorable musical creations across his career. A highlight – in addition to his lively interactions with individual fans – was his tendency to accent autographs by jotting in a variety of musical notes, which he then hummed and sang to the recipient fan, grinning all the way.
 
Actor James Hall, who portrayed “Willie Loomis” for only a week when the character was introduced, attended his first DS event. He was paired onstage with Kathryn Leigh Scott to talk about the early days of DS. Jerry Lacy, Chris Pennock, Lisa Richards, and Roger Davis also participated in interesting audience Q&A sessions. A special highlight was Jim Storm, who played his guitar and wonderfully entertained the audience with several country-western songs.
 
A 2-part memorabilia auction was held midday and in the evening. Proceeds benefited the Woman's Club and CurePSP, the latter in memory of Kathryn's late husband Geoff Miller. Numerous rare and unique items were won by the highest bidders. Notable pieces: Nancy Barrett's actual fangs from the 1970 movie "House of DS"; one of Kathryn's original DS scripts and a costume hairpiece; Bob Cobert's personal vintage clarinet; Josette Music Box reproductions; original DS production slides; DS episode 16mm kinescope films; and other rarities.
 
Lara Parker took the stage in honor of her highly-anticipated new DS novel “Heiress of Collinwood.” Unfortunately, due to lingering laryngitis issues, she did not read from the book as planned. Instead she answered questions and then spoke about the craft of writing. Together, she and the keenly-interested audience engaged in a fascinating and thoughtful shared discussion about what makes a story come alive on many levels: tone, mood, themes, characterizations, descriptions, settings, each reader’s personal interpretations, and more.
 
In the evening, a number of costumed fans came onstage to show their DS and Halloween creativity and enthusiasm, participating in the Fest’s traditional For-Fun Fans’ Costume & Presentation Gala. Each entry was unique, including a delightful “baby werewolf” named Sebastian. Wearing a bright Halloween costume “disguise,” he’s really a service dog to his “mom” (owner), who indicated he’s also “single and looking.”
 
During the day, a variety of special video presentations were shown on the auditorium big screen. One was the 1954 live television drama "The House," written by future DS writer Art Wallace. In 1966 he and Dan Curtis adapted the story as the template for DS' original storyline and characters.  Also seen was a long-lost 1966 ABC-TV DS promotional spot with unique film footage and narration not seen on the series. We shared color newsreel footage of Jonathan Frid in costume as Barnabas at the White House for a 1969 underprivileged children's Halloween party. Also screened were long-unseen 1960s TV commercials with Joan Bennett and Joel Crothers, plus the unaired and uncompleted 2004 DS TV pilot. A special treat was a rough-cut reconstruction of deleted scenes from the 1971 MGM motion picture “Night of DS.” Using closed-captions because the soundtrack is missing, there were 2 sequences. One showed part of a séance to contact Angelique’s spirit. A lengthy segment followed Tracy (Kate Jackson) and Quentin (David Selby) as they search Collinwood’s basement and are terrorized and haunted by Angelique’s ghost.
 
Due to a delivery error, the preview "teaser trailer” for the DS documentary film could not be shown. ShadowGram will provide and update definite information on this exciting full-length feature project very soon.
 
That information and ongoing confirmed DS news will be announced in upcoming ShadowGram Official DS News Online Updates, posted FIRST directly to fans’ inboxes through the free ShadowGram Group List at Yahoo.com.
 
Please contact Marcy Robin at ShadowGram@aol.com or ShadowGram1@yahoo.com for an invitation and/or the easy directions for becoming a Group member.
 
At the Woman’s Club all Saturday, sandwiches, salads, soft drinks, sweets, and snacks were available for purchase. Attendees also received complimentary DS gift items: DVDs, photos, calendars, promotional materials, and much more.
 
On Sunday, Oct. 30, a number of fans journeyed to nearby Greystone Estate in Beverly Hills, a city-owned park that served as Collinwood and the Old House in both the 1991 DS primetime NBC-TV series and in the 2004 unsold WB series pilot. This elegant hilltop estate also is a familiar location for movies, TV shows, commercials, music videos, and other projects.
 
**** DS’ 50th anniversary year is drawing to a close. But there’s an exciting special opportunity to share during DS’ 51st year: The next official event currently set is Oct. 1-8, 2017: The DS New England Cruise.
 
Aboard the Royal Caribbean Line’s “Serenade of the Seas” ship, fans will travel to/from Boston along the New England coast to Maine and beyond, joining DS guests Lara Parker, Kathryn Leigh Scott, and others to be announced.
 
For early details, please visit the Hartford Holidays Travel website page devoted to this specific trip:   www.vbdusa.com/darkshadowscruise2017 or call 800-828-4813. 
 
 
**** LARA PARKER – SIGNING EVENT FOR HER NEW DS NOVEL NOV. 12
 
Fresh from the Hollywood event, LARA presents a book-signing for her 4th DS novel, “Heiress of Collinwood,” at the Dark Delicacies Bookstore in Burbank, CA, on Sat., Nov. 12, from 12:00 noon to 2:00pm.
 
The novel explores the mystery of Victoria Winters, an infant abandoned on the steps of a NYC foundling home in the mid-1900s. That was the only life she knew until, as a young woman, she is mysteriously hired as governess for an unknown family in Collinsport, Maine. There her life becomes a swirl of secrets, magic, danger, supernatural experiences, mysteries – and a love that carries her back in time to the 1790s. But her past and contemporary lives blur and merge until she returns to the 20th century to start a new life and career. Then she receives an odd letter from a Collinsport lawyer urging her to come immediately, for the family she once knew there is in danger…yet again. 
 
The Dark Delicacies Bookstore is a long-recognized popular Los Angeles-area resource for books, posters, specialty items and in-person events related to the horror, fantasy, and science fiction genres.
 
Dark Delicacies Bookstore, 3512 W. Magnolia Blvd., Burbank, CA. (818) 556-6660.
Located on Magnolia Blvd. just off Hollywood Way.
 
Website - http://www.darkdel.com/store/c2/SIGNINGS_.html
Scroll down to see Lara’s event 
 
 
**** SALUTING DS’ 50TH ANNIVERSARY:
TV, ONLINE, MAGAZINE, & NEWSPAPER ARTICLES
 
ShadowGram Online Update #390 (10-27-16) announced broadcast, online, and print sources and publications acknowledging DS’ 50 years, Lara’s new novel, and the show’s history, legacy, and continuing popularity worldwide.
 
Here ShadowGram reports additional broadcast, online, and print coverage of this milestone for the daytime TV series that aired 6-27-1966 to 4-2-1971.
 
---- TV: DECADES CHANNEL SALUTES LARA PARKER & AIRS DS EPISODES MARATHON FOR HALLOWEEN
 
From Sat., 10-29 (12:00 noon) to Mon., 10-31 (6:00am), the channel aired a sequential-episode marathon block, starting after Barnabas’ introduction and ending with Dr. Woodard’s death.
 
It also featured an online factual list focused on Lara:  http://www.decades.com/lists/7-spellbinding-things-you-didnt-know-about-lara-parker-from-dark-shadows
 
---- MeTV shared the same online list about Lara:
http://www.metv.com/lists/7-spellbinding-things-you-didnt-know-about-lara-parker-from-dark-shadows
 
* Please Note: MeTV has mentioned DS in the past but has not broadcast any episodes. Should this change, ShadowGram Online Updates will announce all definite details.
 
---- VANITY FAIR acknowledges DS’ 5 decades and publicizes the Hollywood event: 
http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2016/10/dark-shadows-celebrates-50-years
 
(SG Update #390 reported the Vanity fair article was coming. This is the actual piece)
 
---- Tolucan Times (Hollywood/Los Angeles-area newspaper:   http://tolucantimes.info/inside-this-issue/dark-shadows-50th-anniversary-reunion-oct-29/
 
---- Now available in print: REMINISCE magazine October/November 2016 has a 3-page article, spotlighting the Hollywood event

Thanks, Pat.

Fascinating, Gothick, thanks!


The next panel was Lisa Richards, Jerry Lacy (taking Roger Davis’ place), and Chris Pennock.

A fan found Reverend Trask to be sympathetic.  “Trask was really a nice guy at heart,” Lacy told us, getting laughter.  He just got some bad info.  Regarding the fly that landed on the top of his nose, he said he should’ve hit it with the cross [in his hand].  Instead, he blew on it, which ended up looking like it had flown into his mouth and he was spitting it out.

What have you all done in the past year?  Richards:  She played Amanda [in The Glass Menagerie at The Greenway Court Theatre].  She teaches at the Actor’s Studio, her daughter got married, and she’s been writing a book.  She doesn’t have any other projects in the works.  Her son, musician Alex Ebert, was with her there earlier.

Pennock asked for a show of hands… Who is going to vote?  Thanks to Stephen Mendillo he continues to thrive as an actor and doesn’t have to audition.  He’ll be performing again at the Odyssey Theatre in “Waiting for Grace” [opening November 12].  He asked how many saw him in [Wendy Wasserman’s] “Third”.  There were some whoops from the audience.  He was in Ansel Faraj’s web series “Theatre Fantastique" [in “The Job Interview”] playing a vampire-- something he’d never done before.

Richards says she’ll keep working for Big Finish as long as they keep asking, and she just received notice of another one.  She recently played a small part in a movie called Frank and Ava as Harry Dean Stanton’s wife.  She said he’s funny in it.

Lacy:  Just today, he learned that he and Lara will do more in the BF detective series.  They each wrote one and performed them recently; his was out the time of the Tarrytown Fest and hers will be out soon.  He also made a movie about Frankenstein [“Tales of Frankenstein”] with Don Glut producing and directing.  The series was timed for the 200th anniversary of the publication.  He’s in one of the 4 or 5 vignettes.  His play premiered this past summer in Pennsylvania [“A Reunion of Sorts”].  Some fans made the trek to see it, and Marie Wallace and Sharon Smyth were at the opening.  It’s about two elderly gentlemen that dated the same girl 30 years before.  Now, one is married and the other is divorced with a son.  The girl contacts them that she wants a reunion.  They always got in fights over her.  They start talking and drinking and it “turns into quite a riot.”  You have to see the play, he said, it was a huge success.  He’s been talking to Jim Storm about the two of them doing the play.  It’s only lacking a theater and a producer.  Storms calls out from a side aisle, “There’s a lot of bars around.”

Lacy brought up the scene with Vicki running out of the house because of Lara’s fire.  He grabbed and turned with her held tightly, but she stepped on the inside of his cape and did it again and once more and together they disappeared below the camera.

Pennock (creepy voice):  “You want to know my secrets?”  His is that he badly imitated other actors… Geraldine Page in “Sweet Bird of Youth” or David Niven.  At the Actor’s Studio, he fooled them, he said.  He’s been lucky.  “Thank you Dan Curtis, wherever you are.”

Lela Swift?  Lacy:  She was terrific, hard-driven, and insistent.  Instead of a bit of blocking, she wanted a performance at 7:30 a.m.  She pressed him hard.  One day, expecting her to be on him all morning, he decided this is it, I’m going to let her have it, so he screamed.  Oh stop, stop; save it, save it, she told him.

Where did he get his voices?  Lacy:  For Bogart, I stole the voice from him.  For Trask, he made it up himself.  He added a little bit of Bennet’s mid-Atlantic accent to it.

While discussing their BF characters, Lacy explained that they’ve done so many, they sometimes get them mixed up.  You go into the studio, you tape them, and you’re out of there, he explained.  There was discussion about a character he played named Isaiah who was killed off, but “you never know,” he said.

How about a story from each where something went wrong?  Richards:  The lotus blossom was supposed to open and save her from the werewolf.  The audience was trying to help her.  I was to feed it to him? she asked one helper.  There was a string behind a window that was supposed to open it, but it wouldn’t open.  It wasn’t my fault, she said.

Lacy:  Things were going wrong all the time.

Pennock returned to the Fest stage to applause, and we learn he has the flu!  Do you remember anything going wrong, the others asked him.  He smiled and laughed.  After 3 weeks as Jeb, he was sick as he is now.  His nose started to bleed but he had to keep going.  So, like Donald Trump, he was sniffing it back.  He staggered off and let it go.  Now, he’d be told, “Use it, man.”  There was the scene in which he had the wrong cane, and it was against Elizabeth's neck.  He was doing his James Earl Jones imitation when both realized it was the cane with the knife, but they kept going.  Afterwards, she  said, “You could’ve killed me, assh*le.”  It’s good for the memoirs, he said.

Don Briscoe?  Lacy:  “What a talent. He could have been a huge star.”  Richards:  He was my story, she added...  A dear dear person.  I was so sorry when he left the show.  Very sad.

Richards:  When she was performing in Marat/Sade [in the ‘60s] as Charlotte Corday, John Karlen was in the tub being swabbed.  He didn’t like sitting in a tub, so sometimes he would run around the theater.  “We had to catch him.  You never knew what John was doing or where he would be.”


Next was Roger Davis, who took questions during the autograph/dinner break.  Lara Parker followed, but she was terribly congested, so she discussed her 4th book “Heiress of Collinwood” instead of reading from it.  She didn’t seem (to me) to show all that much respect toward its main character (Victoria), which I hoped was because she wasn’t feeling well, though at 1/3 of the way into the book I’m thinking it wasn’t the cold’s fault.  The rest of the time, she seemed very much like the English teacher she used to be as she called on different audience members while debating the appeal of Dark Shadows.

Jim Storm took the stage next but this is where my report ends.  Thank you for reading.

I miss seeing you, Gothick.

Did Grayson prefer avant garde productions over... mainstream, is that the right word?... stage roles?

You're welcome.

Apparently there's a play called Medea in the Laundromat (1965) written by HM Koutoukas, who passed away in 2010.  During the 1960s, Koutoukas was associated with Sam Shepard and other off off Broadway playwrights.  It's based on the play by Euripides but the action does take place in a laundromat!

Same guy also wrote the fire escape play according to this blurb from http://koutoukas.blogspot.com/:

Suicide Notations (a Play for Fire Escapes)
October 22, 1972: fire escapes of Christopher Street; directed by J. S. Hall, with Lisa Jane Persky, H. M. Koutoukas, Jackie Curtis, Taylor Mead, Ronald Tavel, James Hall, Ron Whyte, Jane Roberts; videotaped by Rudi Stern and the Global Village collective.

Good one, Uncle Roger!  And thank you, Gothick!


At the auction were the usual books, CDs, DVDs, etc., and a coffin set of the series.  Nancy Barretts’s fangs from HoDS sold for $350.

KLS took the stage at 4:30 to auction rare personal items with all proceeds to benefit CurePSP.  Her husband passed away in 2011 after battling the degenerative nerve disease (Progressive Supranuclear Palsy).

The fall that she wore early on in DS (in the "fangs" photo and in NoDS) plus those photos sold for $300.  The curls she wore as Josette and (she thinks) later as Lady Kitty didn’t get any bids.  Her original script of ep #7 went for $80.  The second kinescope of the day went for $200.

Before the next panel started, KLS also spoke about the Woman’s Club of Hollywood-- its history and the organization.