Prop Project: The Box of the Hand of Count Petofi

[Lydia]

Announcement during the opening titles: "Today the role of the box containing the Hand of Count Petofi will be played by a carefully washed out Campbell's Tomato Soup can."

[MagnusTrask]

LOL Lydia!

[loril54]

David made a copy of the box with lincoln logs and his erector set. 

[Lydia]

I watched episode 635 for the Watching Project this morning, and noticed that in that episode we get a rather long look at the box when it's in the upstairs hall in 1968.

The shape of it reminds me of the fancier lunch boxes that some of the kids had when I was in elementary school.

[MagnusTrask]

I think I just saw it in 1897 before Petofi, on the mantlepiece in the carriage house, before Laura moves in.

[Lydia]

Magnus, I'll be keeping an eye out for that.

In episode 650, there's a reasonably good look at the box in the upstairs hall for a few seconds.  It looks as though the design on the lid is a fairly simple geometric one.

Why is that that they didn't get a different box for the Hand?  Surely it wouldn't have been that expensive.  What with Magda's rigmarole about how special the box was, you'd think they could get something new for it, or else deleted the rigmarole.

[Lydia]

Then there is The Box That I Keep Mistaking For the Petofi Box, with a squarer or boxier lid.

I saw a box today in episode 661 that might be the box you're talking about, Magnus.  It's in the Collinwood study on the mantlepiece, and the lid looks sort of like a roof.  I wondered why that box wasn't used to hold the Hand, and thought that perhaps it wasn't long enough - which prompted thoughts of the crew trying out various available boxes for size before choosing the box that had been in the upstairs hall.  Did the chosen box feel like Cinderella?

Here's a look at the chosen box, from 1968, giving an unusually good view of the lid:

[Lydia]

I think I just saw it in 1897 before Petofi, on the mantlepiece in the carriage house, before Laura moves in.

It will be interesting if the box spends some time in the carriage house in 1897, since I saw noticed it in episode 703 on the mantelpiece of the drawing room at Collinwood.  Midnite noted it as well:

Are we all pretending that we don't notice Petofi's box on the drawing room fireplace?

What I want to know is: does this prove that when the 1897 storyline is started, nobody had any idea that the Hand would figure in it?  I understand that 1897 was stretched because it turned out to be so popular; was the Hand part of the stretching?

I also am waiting with bated breath to see what is put on the mantel in the drawing room when the box is taken to house the Hand.

[retzev]

...my understanding is that the inanimate objects that get referred to as “she” are moving vehicles that can be driven or piloted around – cars, boats, planes.  That makes it not a Southern thing but a Sexist thing.

Men give feminine names to things they love and care for  - computers, cars, guitars, whatever the case may be. "She," "her," et cetera, are terms of endearment.

[MagnusTrask]

I believe that Violet Welles threw in the first mention of Count Petofi as one of her evocative backstory references, to tell the story of the Hand, and then it was decided to develop that.    I don't know if I speculated some of that, though.    I think the Hand itself was probably improvised.   Someone who knows for sure had better shut me up and set things straight.

[Lydia]

The box is in Liz's bedroom during the Laura storyline - episode 156, I think, but I'm not sure.

[Lydia]

As Midnite noted, we see the box in episode 723:

And Petofi's box is now in the hallway in 1897

It's in its usual 1968 location.  So far in 1897 we've seen the box on the mantlepiece in the drawing room and in the upstairs hall, before Magda brings it to the Old House with the Hand in it.

I wish I could have seen the prop storeroom for Dark Shadows.  Imagine having to decorate a new set, and heading over to the prop room to check out what's available.  "I'll take Fireplace #2...Box #1...Chinese jar #5...Portrait #24...Lamp #7...the Beige Telephone...Bed #6...Love Potion #9..."

[Taeylor Collins]

I spotted the box in Naomi and Joshua's room today watching 1795!

[MagnusTrask]

If someone photoshops a picture of the Petofi Box and the Afghan floating in space during the early stages of the formation of the Solar System, when the gas cloud was starting to condense into planets, I will somehow build a womb out of spare parts at home and insert it into myself and have that person's baby.

[Pansity]

        

Magnus is the possessor of a mind not merely twisted, but actually sprained. (don't credit me, I stole it from a button!  )

Jeannie