Happy 50th Anniversary, Night of Dark Shadows

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Revisiting two more stills related to Scene 109:

...

Here's an alternate print of the second one above -

(Click here for a 700X844 version)

- quite possibly printed because the other barely showed Tracy - and here's the last -

(Click here for a 1333X1000 version)

- which as far as I'm aware has only been shared as part of the Fest's 2012 NY Weekend Program.

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Revisiting how Scene 110 is scripted and wraps up the sequence:

...

CUT TO: 110    EXT - GREENHOUSE - DAY                            110        as Alex wheels his bike.  They walk toward her        horse.

And that's when today's first quote -

Page 49/Scene 110 - Alex: 'What's new, Trace?'

- comes up, followed by the script explaining:

She hesitates, then decides to tell him.

And that's when today's second quote -

Page 49/Scene 110 - Tracy: 'Something...very strange happened last night and I'm worried about it.'

- comes up, followed by the script continuing with:

He looks at her as she begins to tell him

And so far as any differences in the dialogue go, ... - and Scene 110 actually begins with Tracy asking "What happened" - and to that Alex actually responds with an unscripted "What happened?" before he actually adds "I was exploring. I guess I shouldn't have been. Then the whole place fell down" - and after Alex asks her what's new, Tracy actually replies with "Something sort of funny happened last night, Alex. I'm a little worried about it" - to which Alex responds with an unscripted "Come on, tell me about it" - and Tracy begins an unscripted explanation with "Well, I don't know exactly. I woke up late and I looked for Quentin. He wasn't there. So I, I went to the tower room..."

And so far as any differences in the directions and descriptions go, ... - when Tracy and Alex come out - so, as can be seen in today's first capture, Tracy, Alex and Ulysses don't actually have to go far -

- to retrieve Alex' bike, as opposed to the script having Alex wheel his bike as they walk toward the horse  - and it isn't so much that Alex simply looks at Tracy because Tracy takes Ulysses reins and pulls him behind her as she and Alex walk away from the greenhouse as she -

- begins to explain what happened with Quentin.

   And when it comes to "today's" quotes, they were on January 18th this time around.

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Revisiting more stills:

... I'm going to share six stills. Three that are related in various degrees to Scene 109. Three that aren't really, but are connected to what I've been recently sharing in another way.

Here's the first -

(Click here for a 700X1028 version)

- a copy of which was shared on page 177 of the DS Movie Book (that horse seemed to love to have his photo taken) - and the second was first shared in the NoDS Pressbook as part of the following article -

- obviously she never did emigrate there - and here's the actual still -

- which I suspect may have been taken during the same photo session as the still I reshared in Reply #342 - and here's the last one -

- which was shared on page 131 of the Millennium Edition of the DS Almanac and was obviously taken outside the Lyndhurst mansion and not the greenhouse...

   Reply #342 was most recently revisited as Reply 2497.

And as you van tell from what I shared from the NoDS Pressbook, the still accompanying the Kate Jackson article and its larger version come from the NoDS Editor's Portfolio in which it is still #46.

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

...

And after Tracy arrives on the scene after the ceiling glass has come crashing down, she calls out to Alex to ask if he's all right, and she begins to enter the Greenhouse, Alex warns her with an unscripted "Stay out of here, honey," though the "honey" part isn't included in either the subtitles -

- or the closed captioning -

(ADMIN: Edited to replace TV video screen captures)

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

More stills that are likely related to Scene 109:

Here are two behind the scenes stills that I believe are related to the shooting of Scene 109. And I say that because there are several stories about how everyone had to wear hard hats while the scene was shot. Well, everyone except for Kate Jackson and, more significantly, John Karlen because they had to be inside the Greenhouse during the scene. Karlen's part of the scene made him especially vulnerable because he had to be inside for an extended period of time and inside while glass came crashing down from the roof. But apparently he was a real trooper. In fact the was a real trooper throughout the whole sequence because not only did he enter a dangerous glass building to shoot a scene, but as has been mentioned before, he rode a bicycle when he'd never done so before.

But be all that as it were, here are the two stills -

- they were among the stills I rediscovered not that long ago, and so far as I know, I don't believe they've ever been officially published...

  I forgot to mention yesterday that another reason I believe the stills are from NoDS is that I'm pretty sure that's NoDS' Director of Photography Richard Shore in the cherry picker with DC.

...

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Revisiting the subtitles/closed captioning for Scene 110:

When it comes to Scene 110, rather than the "What happened?" that's scripted for Tracy to ask near the end of Scene 109, the line is held for the beginning of Scene 110 and Tracy actually delivers it as -

- as both the subtitles and the closed captioning -

- reflect, and to which Alex replies at first with an unscripted -

- and the closed captioning has Alex stating an unscripted "I don't know" before he begins to deliver the scripted "I was exploring. I guess I shouldn't have been. Then the whole place fell down.", which is also transplanted to Scene 110 from the end of Scene 109 -

- but the subtitles don't acknowledge that unscripted bit beforehand -

...

(ADMIN: Edited to replace TV video screen captures)

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

And wrapping up the subtitles/closed captioning for Scene 110

... after Alex asks Tracy what's new and she tells him she's a little worried about something sort of funny that happened the previous night, Alex responds with an unscripted "Come on, tell me about it," which is acknowledged by both the subtitles -

- and the closed captioning -

- and Tracy begins an unscripted explanation with "Well, I don't know exactly. I woke up late and I looked for Quentin. He wasn't there. So I, I went to the tower room..." -

- which the subtitles basically gets correct with just a missing word or two here and there, which is the same case as with the closed captioning -

...

(ADMIN: Edited to replace TV video screen captures)

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Comments about the look of the closed captioning:

Can't remember if I said this before, but those closed captions look like they're made from a Dymo label maker.

...

You know, that's exactly what they look like. Excellent observation. 

...

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Revisiting the other greenhouse stills I mentioned:

And I'm sharing the next three stills simply because they were shot at the greenhouse. On the same day as the others? Who knows? But perhaps...

Here's the first -

- and the second has been shared as September's photo in the Fest's 1999 Movie Calendar -

(Click here for a 915X620 version)

- and here's an alternate version with just Nancy and Chris -

- was the greenhouse simply cropped out? Who knows? However, a version that shows Nancy's entire hand appears on page 179 of the DS Movies Book...

And as an aside, a still of Nancy reclining in the grass in front of Lyndhurst and wearing the same outfit (my copy of the still) appears on page 181 of the DS Movies Book - can you even imagine if she had worn the outfit as Claire when she and Tracy go to Gregory's store?!

 

[Uncle Roger]

Hot pants in Collinsport!!! A definite traffic stopper!!

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Oops - once again I forgot this:

Yesterday I forgot that since making the above post back in 2022 I've come across better versions of these two stills:

(Click here for a 700X476 version)

And:

(Click here for a 500X734 version)

...

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Oops again - I also forgot about this:

After I posted this -

...

And as an aside, a still of Nancy reclining in the grass in front of Lyndhurst and wearing the same outfit (my copy of the still) appears on page 181 of the DS Movies Book - can you even imagine if she had worn the outfit as Claire when she and Tracy go to Gregory's store?!

- I discovered this version which shows a lot more, particularly of Lyndhurst -

- as well as this one in which Nancy is wearing the same turtleneck -

- and which I'm not aware has been published anywhere - and all I'll say about this one, which I've definitely never seen published anywhere, is that I hope Nancy posed for it on a nice warm Spring day while the film was in production in late April or early May -

- and not a cold day in March! 

...

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Revisiting some posts regarding the bikini photo:

I've seen at least one black and white photo of Nancy Barrett in the bikini but this is the first time I've seen a color shot of it! Were there ever plans to do a beach scene in any version of the script? Or maybe Nancy was going to use someone's swimming pool? I hope that she wasn't going to go for a swim in the nearby Hudson River which at that point would have been extremely toxic.

Were there ever plans to do a beach scene in any version of the script? Or maybe Nancy was going to use someone's swimming pool?

I don't think so, but who knows? When I first saw the still I did think it was an odd one because it seemed completely unrelated to the film. But then there are those stills with Nancy and Chris Pennock that are also completely unrelated to the film.

Perhaps DC told Nancy he was thinking of doing a remake of The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini, but with loads of blood and gore, naturally, and to also be shot at Lyndhurst with Nancy in the lead? The still was his way of getting a jump on publicity shots?    (After all, they already had a photographer on site who was already getting paid to take photos, so knowing DC he would have seen it as a perfect way to save money.) But that film, like a third DS film, never came to be?

No? Well, then who knows why on earth Nancy ever posed in a bikini?

Trading Nancy Sinatra for Nancy Barrett? I could get behind that. Let yourself go. Yell Geronimo!

You know, maybe DC's potential remake of The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini never came about because DC couldn't lock down Piccola Pupa to reprise her role. Maybe DC thought she was such an indelible part of the original, there was no way doing a remake could live up to the original.    And maybe DC also could have pictured her covered in blood and that image alone was what he was going frame the entire film around, but without her...

No? Well then again, who knows why on earth Nancy ever posed in a bikini?

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Hot pants in Collinsport!!! A definite traffic stopper!!

Definitely! And actually, I'm somewhat surprised that Carolyn never wore them because if any character would, it would have been her. But then I suppose hot pants weren't the Ohrbach's esthetic, especially when their mission in supplying their clothes to TV shows was to get what they perceived to be mostly housewives in the audience to buy them. In all likelihood, their main hope was still a bit dated and aimed more at the "Donna Reed" set watching than the "Joey Heatherton" set?

But I still think if Claire had worn that hot pants outfit to Gregory's store, it would have been a hoot and a half!!    But alas...

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Revisiting how the beginning of Scene 111 is scripted in DC's script:

Setting up the new scene (and once again the version in Grayson's script is different from the one in DC's (for one, in Grayson's version the scene takes place in Collinwood's library) - but we're going to wait until all of DC's version has been presented before we go back to Grayson's version):

CUT TO: 111    EXT - RAILROAD BRIDGE - DAY                      111        As Quentin leans over the guard rail, Alex        hovers over him, telling him what happened at        the Greenhouse.  Quentin looks quickly at him,        disbelief on his face.

And that's when today's quote -

Page 50/Scene 111 - Quentin: 'You were a fool ever to go in there...'

- comes up.

And so far as any differences in the dialogue, the directions, and the descriptions go, at this point we can't compare the script to the film because this scene only appears in the 129 minute version of the film. However, we can get into DC's notations for the scene, and they indicate that at the beginning of the scene Alex and Quentin are being shot in a 2 shot. Though, as we've learned from scenes that are in the shorter versions of the film, we can't necessarily expect that all of DC's notations are the ways in which the scene actually plays.

   As far as "today's quote" goes, it was January 19th's this time around.