FreshMayo, absolutely love your handle and avatar!

It's nice to see someone else keeping alive the sacred flame at the Clarice Blackburn altar.

Best,

G.

Very stylish and cool.  It looks as if inspired by THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN but with a much darker, more explicitly Gothic edge.

G.

Fans,

Over the President's Day weekend, I had the opportunity to catch a preview of the "new" Jim Jarmusch film ONLY LOVERS LEFT ALIVE, about a pair of star-crossed vampire lovers, Adam and Eve, played by Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycOKvWrwYFo

I've been hearing about this project ever since Jarmusch started talking about it back in 2011.  The film was actually completed in 2012.  Filming happened mainly in Detroit and Tangier.  The film only really shares in common with DS the theme of "supernatural" beings whose story involves some very human emotional complications.  I am totally in awe of the art direction, the writing, the use of music and imagery... the pace is very slow (I prefer to think of it as leisurely) and the focus is on character dynamics, mood, atmosphere, and carefully built emotional tension.  Mia Wasikowska plays the sister of the Tilda character, John Hurt plays an aged Christopher Marlowe (yes, the Elizabethan playwright) living as a vampire in Tangier, and Anton Yelchin is a cute, clueless lad who is the Hiddles character's Willie.

I think DS fans might find this one very interesting.  The US release is supposed to be sometime in April but it is unclear whether it will be a full, nationwide release or only selected cities as an initial test.

G.

I looked on Amazon just now for the Dracula score CD and couldn't find it.  Is it only going to be available at the event?  Marketed through MPI?  any further info?

G.

Is Sophia meant to be a cook in addition to somebody who takes care of household chores?  Is she doing the Mrs. Johnson role?  I guess we wouldn't have heard this Roger complaining about "yet another of Sophia's boiled dinners..."

I know these are random but these are the things that go through my mind...call it the Shadows Syndrome...lol

G.

I'd enjoy seeing a photo of her from the appearance, should anyone feel moved to post one.  I don't get the channel and I don't really need to see the episode itself.

G.

All of this is very subjective, of course... for me, as I have complained a number of times, the Barnabas and Angie stuff in Depp Shade was just way too arch and over-the-top... the Liz dialogue was good but I think that's a tribute to Pfeiffer's prowess--and her scenes with Helena as Julia had a spark and an edge to them that I found sorely lacking otherwise.  Why I like Grayson's scenes so much in the OS is that sense of "edge" and the unexpected she can bring to a scene, particularly when she's matched with an actor such as Karlen or HAA.

That said, my least favorite things in this WB version were the handling of Angelique and, to some extent, Liz--I wish we had heard behind the scenes stuff about just what was going on with the direction of Blair Brown, a very accomplished actress from what I have heard.  I have to wonder if the scene of Vicki's arrival at Collinwood might have been re-staged had the network ordered the series and the pilot actually been aired as episode one.  In the case of BtVS as I recall, a pilot was produced and then a completely new episode one was shot... I wonder if that might have happened had the network moved forward with DS.  From reading the thread from 2004, the dumping of it seemed more about network politics and a fairly strong switch in where they were moving with their programming, than about the failure of the pilot as delivered to come together...

Just some idle thoughts.


G.