More Upcoming on Cannon

[Josette]

Kosmo pointed out another - John Lasell.  I had to look him up and he turned out to be Dr. Peter Guthrie.  And, I had to look up the character!  I remember that Laura storyline and the doctor, but forgot it was a different doctor.

So, I looked up his Cannon and it's episode 19 of the first season.  The Pennock one I mentioned yesterday is #10, so it will be soon.  It's a bit too far away to be on my TV listing, but I'm assuming it's Friday - Saturday (Saturday, Feb. 12 3AM Eastern).  It turns out he's also in one the following season.  Hopefully, I'll remember to look that up closer to the time.  This Feb. 12 one is called "The Island Caper."  I remember that one and think it's a good one.  Don't know what his part was.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

It will be quite interesting to see the John Lasell eps because I've never seen him play any role other than Dr. Guthrie.

Thanks for the heads up, Josette (and Kosmo). 

[Josette]

Kosmo added that he thought another Mitch Ryan one was coming up in season 1, so I checked it out - it's the final one of the season - so that should be about a week after the Lasell - I'll try to remember it closer to the time.  I definitely remember that one and his third a few years later (the one with Kathy Cody).

By the way, re other roles for Lasell - it turns out he was in the "Twilight Zone" episode "Back There" when a man travels back in time to the night of Lincoln's assassination and Lasell is John Wilkes Booth.

[Uncle Roger]

John Lasell, who is apparently still with us, has a fairly extensive list of credits on imdb. Lots of vintage TV shows, like a guest shot on Checkmate, with fellow DS actor Anthony George and a run on As The World Turns as the original Michael Shea, one of Lisa's many husbands on As The World Turns. And three appearances on the original Perry Mason: The Case of The Latent Lover, The Case of The Crafty Kidnapper and (my favorite, just for the title) The Case of The Promoter's Pillbox.

[Bob_the_Bartender]

Yes, I’ve seen John Lasell in a few other roles on television. I think he may have been in an episode of “One Step Beyond,” an eerie anthology series that ran from 1959 into 1961. The show was hosted by and directed by the late John Newland, who was wonderfully ethereal and eloquent as the program’s narrator.

As to John Lasell as psychic investigator Dr. Peter Guthrie on DS, writer David Hofstede, author of, quite naturally, “David Hofstede’s Dark Shadows’ Video Reviews,” had a problem with John Lasell’s portrayal of the Ivy League university academic. David Hofstede thought Mr. Lasell was rather bland as a man, who dealt with such esoteric and other-worldly matters. I believe he wrote that John Lasell came off more like a tax attorney than a sage and compelling supernatural researcher, like our own greatly respected and much beloved Professor T. Elliott Stokes. By the way, if Dr. Guthrie and Professor Stokes ever crossed paths (or swords), I wonder how that encounter/confrontation would have played out? Would it have been an amicable and civilized meeting of two highly intellectual men or would it have been as “cordial” as, say, Garden State waste management consulting executive Tony Soprano meeting with the unfailingly “convivial” New York crime boss, Phil Leotardo?

Alas, we’ll never know what kind of “meeting of the minds” it would have truly been if Dr. Guthrie and Professor Stokes had exchanged bon mots and tales of encounters with witches, warlocks and man-made men. Such is life.