Samantha Collins - Virginia Vestoff vs. KLS

[murph]

I am currently watching two different periods of Dark Shadows.  On the DVD's I'm at set 13 disc 3 but I haven't yet finished the videos I taped last year on Sci-fi.  I just finished watching the episode where Desmond is arrested for witchcraft.  I did see the show all the way through the last time it aired on Sci-fi about 3 1/2 years ago.

I got to thinking about the character of Samantha Collins.  I know that the part was originally written with KLS in mind but that was not meant to be when she left the series just before the 1840 time period began. 

Samantha is a very complicated character with a lot more depth IMO than any of the characters KLS portrayed.  Virginia Vestoff did a great job portraying her.  I wonder if the character would have been as complex if KLS had portrayed her.  IMO the writer's always dumbed down KLS' characters and they rarely showed any depth at all.  In the beginning of the series Maggie Evans had spunk but starting with Barnabas kidnapping her I don't believe the character ever recovered from being the eternal victim and clueless SYT. 

IMO the writers seemed to not have the confidence in KLS to carryoff a complex character so they didn't write one for her.  I don't really know if KLS had the acting ability to carry it off because I never saw her in anything else besides Dark Shadows.  I think when the writers realized the acting chops of Virginia Vestoff they created a very complex character for her.  Maybe she would have been just as complex a character with KLS portraying her but I tend to believe they would have dumbed her down.  Alas, we'll never know.

What do you think?

Murph

[stefan]

Interesting...I read somehwere that KLS admitted she was immature at the time of DS and this may have affected her performances somewhat. Certainly, she didn't have the adventurous and sophisticated acting chops of Laura Parker who, I read, wasn't that much older than KLS. I think of all those girls Nancy Barrett might have been the eldest at 26 or something.
My opinion is that KLS may have to have been pushed by a sensitive director but she did have the potential to do more. Sometimes she held back some but on other occasions I sense she did have a clue of what she was doing. She seemed to specialize in portraying denial and misplaced emotions. Confrontation was not her strong point. KLS also had a nice radience about her and a good stage/film presence and was likeable but she may have coasted a bit on this. I felt she was much improved on the Dark Shadows movie she was in.

[jennifer]

Good points murph! Virgina V was great as Samantha and i guess
we will never know how KLS would have done. i think she did a good job
as Maggie they just never let her shine once they cast her a a SYT
she was great with Joe too bad he left! it is also sad that Virgina and Joel
passed so young would have loved to see them at the fests!

jennifer

[Gerard]

I would've hoped that if TLATKLS remained with the series and took the part of Samantha, that the character would've remained as cold, calculating and downright cruel as performed by the wonderful Virginia Vestoff.  Finally, Miss Scott would've had the chance to play a nasty, conniving critter, and if they would have kept the part that way I'm sure she would've had a lotta fun doing it.  The closest she came to anything remotely like that was when she first played Lady Kitty Hampshire in 1897.  She started off as a wonderful golddigger, plotting on how to woo Edward just so she could get into his wallet.  And the first time she met her nemisis, Count Petofi, she had no problem giving him a what-for.  But, unfortunately, they rather quickly "devolved" her character back into the suffering, tormented, hapless and helpless girl.  I just can't help but imagine what it would've been like if they had kept the Lady Hampshire persona firey and full of beans.  She would have been a great and powerful enemy against Petofi, wanting to get him for what he did to her husband, plus seeking to protect her own interest in the Collins family which was $$$$$$.  Even though it would partially or greatly be for her own self-interest, she could've teamed up with Barnabas, Angelique, et. al. in a rather tense, not completely trusting, alliance in battling the fiend, using her womanly wiles to disarm him at least temporarily so they could get some whammies in against him.

Gerard

[Gothick]

A few points...

I think KLS underestimates how good she was in her early DS storylines.  I thought she was wonderful, especially in the Joe courtship storyline, and she really held her own when Maggie has to visit Collinwood for the first time to deal with the flack from "Pop's" dealings with the Collinses.  So many wonderful scenes here... I also thought she was excellent in the early Kitty scenes.

That said, I thought Vestoff was so good as Samantha, and I thought it was better to have a new actress to play the role because that way the writers did not have any subtextual stuff from all the previous work KLS had done on the series.  If KLS had stayed, and if she had played Samantha, I am sure she would have done fine, memorable work in the role.  However, by the time the actual scripts were written, KLS was gone.

There's a wonderful photo essay showing a typical day in Vestoff's working life in 1970 in Stuart Little's book, Off Broadway:  the Prophetic Theatre.

G.

[Joeytrom]

I wonder that if KLS was Samantha, they would have Barnabas swooning over her for her resemblence to Josette as with Rachael and Kitty in 1897.

[IluvBarnabas]

I love Kathryn in all her roles (especially as Maggie) but it would had she been cast as Samantha you can just bet Barnabas would definitely be "commenting" how much she resembled Josette Collins. And since Samantha and Quentin didn't have a good marriage to begin with, had Kathryn been cast would Barnabas have pursued her even though she was married to a family member? I'd like to think he wouldn't [spoiler](unlike the 1897 Quentin who had no qualms about fooling around with his brother's wife) plus he had already discovered "a new love" Roxanne and was by that time finally getting over losing Josette.[/spoiler]

I was sad to see Kathryn go but on the other hand I think Virginia was just excellent as Samantha and don't want to imagine anyone else in the role.