Forty years ago--April 2, 1971

[Sandor]

I had stopped watching the show around the time of the David & Hallie/Gerard & Daphne story (my mom put me in some after-school program from the fall of 1970 onward, so I lost touch with DS from that point on).  Months later, when I heard the series had ended recently - I was back east visiting the old neighborhood during Easter in '71 - I remember how devastated some of the kids were: suddenly it was 4pm on a Monday, and they were at a total loss. Sure they could play on the swings or go buy some candy at the corner store, but for the last 3-4 years, they'd been sitting faithfully in front of that TV set every weekday afternoon, tuned in to ABC, waiting for Barnabas to swoop along.

There was another short-lived soap or two I had followed prior to DS' departure ("The Best Of Everything", also on ABC, and "Hidden Faces" - I think on NBC), so that softened the blow about Dark Shadows: I was already seasoned at saying goodbye to axed daytime stories I'd been watching by age 8! 

[Nancy]

I remember that I was not as regular a viewer sometime after 1897 though now I don't remember how much longer after that.  The after school activities was a big lure for me so about three afternoons a week I was off involved in all that.  I remember being home for the very last episode though and watching it, recalling how I would never ever miss an episode for the first two or so the show was on!

[Taeylor Collins]

In the biography that Julia99 did, it states that DC was totally against the idea of killing Julia. I suspect Grayson would have stayed at least five more years had the show continued.  If Joan had left she probably would have filled a sort of matriarchal role in the Collins family, even if she and Barnabas didn't marry. I am actually kind of playing with that idea for a story....

[loril54]

That is an interesting idea. Julia would have made a great matriarch for the Collins family. She really does know where a lot of the bodies are buried.

What name do you write stories under, Taeylor do you have any that are on the web?

[Taeylor Collins]

I have yet to post any online. I am writing a story for my zine that is coming out in the fall.  This story may not be in this zine but probably in the next one.   The current story I wrote in the coming zine deals with Angelique and the how the Parallel Time room was created!

[Lydia]

In the biography that Julia99 did, it states that DC was totally against the idea of killing Julia. I suspect Grayson would have stayed at least five more years had the show continued.  If Joan had left she probably would have filled a sort of matriarchal role in the Collins family, even if she and Barnabas didn't marry.

If Frid had left the show, as lori54 had suggested, Curtis might have changed his mind.  I can't see Julia Hoffman becoming a Collins matriarch, but if Julia had been killed off, maybe Grayson Hall could have been cast as Aunt Katherine from Boston, who gets a mention in the summer of 1967.

[Taeylor Collins]

Who knows?  She could have married another Collins that perhaps could have been brought into the picture?  Endless possiblities.  I would say MB should know.  Didn't Frid sign four more years once they created Bramwell???

The story I am working on Carolyn basically appoints her honorary Matriarch after her Mother's death.  I am still working on it though. I ha ve written in a while but I have my outlines and have already typed out a bout 10 pages of the story.  It possible may turn into novel.  It's kind of ambitious!  We will see...

[Gothick]

Hi Taeylor,

I don't know whether this helps, but it was reported in one of the magazines in early '71 that Keith Prentice had been signed for a five year contract.  Given that DC was notorious for stringing longstanding players along without any set contract at all, I am unsure how to evaluate this statement, even in a magazine publication.  (It may have been that Prentice told a reporter he had been told he would probably be on the show at least five years and this was interpreted as his having a contract.)

Sam might have suggested killing Julia off because I can imagine that by 1970/71, Grayson was starting to complain frequently about how bored she was with playing that "straight-ass," Julia Hoffman. 

I do think it's fascinating that after all this time and the deaths of Norma and DC, it's still not clear that DC must have made the decision to pull the plug on the series.  But to me, that is the only interpretation of the events that makes any sense.

G.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Who knows?  She could have married another Collins that perhaps could have been brought into the picture?  Endless possiblities.  I would say MB should know.

I don't really know anything beyond what was written in Sam Hall's TV Guide article and what's been said at various Fests and written elsewhere. Nearly everything involving Julia in the TV Guide article would seem to be a fantasy outcome because it doesn't seem likely the show would have had Julia, Barnabas and Adam in some location in Asia completely separate from the action in Collinsport. Hall even makes some remark to the effect that much of what he wrote was merely signposts to where the characters' lives might have gone. But considering that ultimately it appeared that Hall would have liked to have seen Julia and Barn get together (which was also many in the audience own fervent desire, if the feedback letters from fans are any indication), it seems unlikely that they had any real plans in 1971 to kill off Julia (which would have caused an uproar from said fans that would have made the reaction to Leviathans seem like an extremely small annoyance).

Didn't Frid sign four more years once they created Bramwell???

I don't believe it was ever said just how long Frid's new contract was to last.

[Taeylor Collins]

Thanks MB. I wasn't clear about in the post.  The who "knows" part was for Frid's contract.  All the same thanks for your thoughts. 

I truly beleive DC pulled the plug. 

[Zahir]

According to the most experienced time traveller I know, time is not as we would imagine it.  Rather he describes it as a "wibbley wobbley timey whimey" kind of thing.

[Taeylor Collins]

LOL Zahir! "Time Travel gives me a headache was there favorite line on Charmed..."  I agree!!

[MagnusTrask]

"Time Travel gives me a headache was there favorite line on Charmed..."

(I just saw that piece of conversation on a tape recently...)

[IluvBarnabas]

My personal spin--which I suppose is as good of a guess as anybody's since we've never know--is that Barn was still a vampire (he was under the Leviathan curse, not Angelique's curse when he entered 1840).

I prefer to think that Barnabas was human by the time he, Julia and Stokes came back to 1971, regardless of which curse he was under when he went to 1840. Besides, when we leave Barnabas and Julia for the last time, wasn't it in the daytime?

Besides, I'm still not convinced that Barnabas, Julia and Stokes didn't return to another sort of parallel time Collinwood, one where the rest of the family knew who they were, but no haunting ever took place...maybe other events hadn't happened as well, such as Quentin's haunting, the werewolf stalkings, the Leviathan conspiracy. If that's the case, then it would make sense that Barnabas WOULD still be human, having never been recursed if there had never been any Jeb Hawkes or Leviathans.