barbara steele and karen black placed handprints in cement in front of the theatre.

So, how was the turnout? Was it well attended and did Cobert put his handprints too?

Nearly sold out.  Empty seats were very rare, anyway.  As for Cobert, a foot...

Midnite,  yes that mausoleum in the film did look very much like the secret room on Dark Shadows.

I loved the part in the film, when that Nazi plane bombed the cemetery and literally kayoed Tessla the vampire.  I wonder if an American B-52 bomber ever accidentally dropped a bomb on the Collins mausoleum as Barnabas was about to bite Maggie, would Barnabas too have been completely kayoed like Tessla was?

And, what about Andreas (sp?), the werewolf/slave of Tessla?  Andreas was the first (and only) speaking werewolf, I've ever seen in a horror film.  As I remember, Lon Chaney, Jr., Michael Landon, Oliver Reed and James Naughton all snarled in their respective werewolf fillms!   

Great list of werewolves!  (Except you meant brother David; James "Nexium" Naughton was one of young Midnite's crushes.  Oh hell, he still is!   )

Coincidentally, "The Return of the Vampire" is screening in Santa Monica tonight (Aero Theatre, along with "Fearless Vampire Killers") at the same start time as the DS Halloween event at the Vista.  The double feature costs $10 vs. $20 for the DS event.  I hope I chose wisely.  

Wanda Paisley, yes!  I would've enjoyed a longer stay for her on the show, and was there a character with a cooler name?  And actually, I could've stood less Garth Blackwood, but that's me.

It would be great to see Elizabeth Eis return to a Fest.  BuzzH, Paula Laurence passed away about a year ago.

Definitely Buffy Harrington!  She was the most "real" of them all, making a living, having an apartment......and one that contained the only television set seen on the entire series.

The only one in Collinsport, but not the only one seen on the series.  

 

Thanks, Sunny Collins!

I've often thought of asking if anyone is in touch with Nicky - however busy he is with whatever he's doing, I couldn't believe that someone that involved with DS doesn't show up here once in a while.  Doctoral studies - wow!  Do you know in what?

Playwriting.  He still plans to finish Shadows on the Wall, btw, but is so busy at the present time with school.

Josette, I remember being shocked by your dedication to visiting the SF boards and reading everything... while standing at a library computer!  Was it '97 when you started posting?

You're right, MB...it was fun in those days, wasn't it? I remember when there were maybe a dozen of us posting regularly, and in touch with each other in private emails.

It was a blast!

I remember getting one first email in particular, from a woman who told me she liked something I had posted, and that she was very new to it all, had to ask her 7 year old son how to do a search, and that her first search was for Dark Shadows. Now just look at what that woman can do now!

That kid is 17 now.  So much has happened... Sheenasma, where did the time go?  <sigh>

"The Return of the Vampire" had a wonderfully spooky graveyard set in the film.  I wonder if the Dark Shadows set designers were inspired by that highly-underrated Bela Lugosi film, when they designed the Eagle Hill Cemetery set?  

Bob the Bartender, I thought the same thing!  I also see a similarity between the mausoleum that contained Tessla's coffin and the secret room of the Collins mausoleum, though the former's opened to the outside whereas Barn's has the anteroom.  And the first thing we see as Lugosi comes out of his coffin is the hand wearing one large ring, which becomes important to the plot, though it's actually worn on his ring finger.