Final Goodbye" Jonathan Frid's Most Revealing Interview
By Stephen Lewis
TV By Day
November, 1971
The familiar rooms of Collinwood had a strange new look to them.
The furniture and props were pushed back against the walls, and a bar
and a buffet had been set up. Guests, the stars of Dark Shadows, the
stars who had left the show and friends, wandered through the maze of
cameras, laughing and talking about their experiences during the five
year history of the show.
Upstairs, on the upper floor of the ABC-TV studio in New York,
other members of the cast gave their dressing rooms a final going
over, took a last look at the makeup and wardrobe rooms that had been
part of their daily routine for so long, and went downstairs to say
their good-byes.
Dark Shadows had taped its final episode and was going off the
air.
Jonathan Frid, unlike the rest of the cast, couldn't join in the
nostalgic mood of the party. He was starring in a special stage
production of Murder In The Cathedral and had to hurry off to a
rehearsal.
But just a few days before, as we sat in his spacious East Side
apartment, Jonathan had had plenty of time to express his feelings on
the death of the soap that had made him a star, feelings that many of
his fans may not be aware of.
"Miss it?" Jonathan asked, reflecting on his three and a half
years as a member of the cast. "Of course I will. The show, heaven
knows, has been very good to me, and very good for me. But I dont
feel terribly saddened. It's just time to go on to something else."
Most of the cast are going on to a second Dark Shadows movie.
Conveniently, the movie went into production just a few days after
the serial went off the air. Jonathan won't be seen in the screen
version, though, and he explained why.
"They wanted me to play Barnabas," he revealed. "As you know,
the Barnabas character met his final end on the show some while back
and I must say I was rather happy about it. I didnt want to revive
the role for the movie, and the fact is that I never, ever want to
play Barnabas again!
"I really haven't the least interest in the supernatural. I
studied the occult a bit when I began on the show. I wanted to learn
about the character I was playing. But over the years, people have
come to think that I'm very involved with it personally. They've
confused my identity with the character I play, and that isnt good.
"For so long, people have thought of me as Barnabas. I've been
flattered, of course its a sign that people responded to my acting,
to my performance. But there were things I had to do, tours for the
show and things, that were pretty embarrassing.
"The straw that broke the camel's back, so to speak, about my
doing Barnabas, was a letter inviting me to join an occult society --
one of many. It made me aware of the danger that people will
associate me with Barnabas as long as I live almost like Johnny
Weissmuller and Tarzan. For an actor who wants to do things, it's
frightening.
"The whole occult thing bores me. I don't even read my horoscope
in the daily paper.
"What I want to see now is just what the Barnabas image has done
for me in the business, among producers and so forth. Id like, very
much, to do some stage work, and Id love doing my own TV series.
"As for movies, well, to be very honest, its a very different
thing from television or the stage. There is so much waiting around,
so much boredom. You have to stand there while they arrange lights
and things, and it takes forever.
The Dark Shadows film was made rather quickly, and I didnt like
it. There were some moments that I felt were all right, and a few
that I enjoyed. But generally, the whole experience was pretty
embarrassing. Yes, people came to see it, but the reviews were
horrifying.
"And for an actor, no matter what you are doing, you want to
bring the best of your craft to your work. I wouldn't mind doing some
other movies. I'd like to, just to see if I can work in that medium.
"Ive been offered roles, but I wont do Barnabas or anything
remotely related to him. No vampires, no monsters, no
necrophiliacs! Im not trying to delude myself, I know that there are
many people who will confuse Jonathan Frid with Barnabas. I've been,
over the past year or so, very grateful to the magazines for writing
about Jonathan Frid and not just Barnabas. But making the public
understand that the character isnt my whole identity will
take work in something very strong.
"I need to find a good manager. The fans I have are wonderful,
but Ill need a good manager to get work.
Jonathan also discussed a question that many viewers have is just
why did Dark Shadows go off the air?
"You have to remember," Jonathan explained, "that the show had a
very good run --five years, after all, is a long time. What
happened? I guess its pretty much the same thing that happens when
you are a child going to serials on Saturday afternoons. You see
Tarzan jumping off a huge cliff, and the first time youre thrilled.
"The next week, you see the same thing, pretty much, happening, and
you begin to realize that the cliff isnĢt really that high. And then,
as the weeks go by, you begin to outgrow the whole fantasy.
"In a soap opera, half of the success is identification --
viewers identifying the actors with the characters they play. We
tried to change stories, to drop one story and pick up another, and
to change characters. It may have educated the public that actors
are not the people they play, but I think it hurt us. Quite frankly,
I think we knew the show was on its last legs long before the
cancellation was announced -- maybe as far back as last November. I
was almost out of the show on the first of the year, but I wanted to
try another character.
"We could have done something else, we could have revived Barnabas
and then done that whole biting bit again, but I didnt want to. When
Dan Curtis, the producer, and I discussed the movie, I told him I
wouldnt play Barnabas in the second film.
"He said, 'Well, I guess you want to get out of the show, too. I
hadnt been bargaining for that, but I said to myself, 'Why not? maybe
its time." As it worked out, though, I stayed.
"Actually, I should have left a year or two ago, when the show
was at its peak, to capitalize on the success of the series. Of
course after doing the same thing you wonder what will happen, but Im
not sure thats bad -- too much security isnt good for an actor. I dont
really care if I don't have the popularity I had on Dark Shadows, as
long as I work and have a good income. I don't want to play 'star'.
On stage, its one thing -- its your work and its honest. Offstage,
its something else. All stars are liars, liars because they are
giving the public an image. They're still performing offstage, and the
public believes they're like that. Its not really true. When an
actor goes off stage, he's through acting star never stops."
Just what will Jonathan do now?
"I'm really not sure -just look for work. Ideally, I suppose I'd
like a Broadway show for a while, then TV, some movies. What I really want to do is
grow as an actor.
Ive had a very big youth following, and Ive liked it. But I'm
not a child. I'm forty-seven. I hope that my audiences, my fans will
grow with me when I do other things. Before I did the show, I never
had any experience with that kind of mass popularity. I'm grateful
for it. I'm grateful for the letters, for the fans, for all the
magazines who've been kind to me.
"Ive had to learn to work fast, and I think in the long run that
has helped my acting. I hope that's the case, and I suppose the
future will tell it.
"Right now, I'm very optimistic about the future. I want to be
able to take some time for myself, to relax. That's something I
couldn't do as long as the show was running. Also, in the past few
months, it's been kind of hard. I guess you could say that the mood
in the studio, at times, was a bit depressing since everyone knew we
were going off and that it was just a matter of time. We knew it
long before the final date was announced."
Thousands of Dark Shadows fans did their best to postpone that
final date with letters to ABC, and they can take some condolence in
the fact that while the series may be off, the series of movies based
on it may continue forever.
Jonathan's personal following - the largest of any star in Dark
Shadows history -- can expect to see him turning up in a number of
movies and in guest spots on the major TV series. Since his
availability has become known, Jonathan has been offered numerous
scripts and parts, and now it's a matter of just selecting what's
best for him.
"I don't want to make a mistake," he says,"about what I choose
next. It will be an important move in my career."
One thing that Jonathan Frid can be sure of, is no matter where
his career takes him, his many fans will be happy to go along!
