I heard this sad news a few hours ago on the international Social Networking Site.  I was shocked as I considered Ms. Black "too young to die."  She was about a year and a half younger than my own mother (and Lara Parker) as it happens.

I was thinking about Ms. Black a few weeks ago when a fan started a thread here about what role Ms. Black would have played had she been cast in the original series of Dark Shadows.  I had to smile because I recalled that many years ago now, when a gala was held at the Museum of Television and Radio in Dan Curtis's honor, many DS luminaries showed up, and Ms. Black made a late entrance to the room.  At the time it was reported that she was overheard to look around her, narrow her eyes, and demand of a flunky:  "Wait a minute, this isn't a Dark Shadows thing, is it?"  She was assured that it was indeed an evening in honor of DC and she proceded to her place onstage.

I also think of a performance art band, maybe based in NYC, about 23 years ago called "The Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black"--it was written up in Michael Musto's column and I believe Ms. Black may have eventually attended, or even participated in, a performance.

May she know true peace.  We'll miss her.

G.

Wow, I thought I knew a lot about DS, but you guys have me beat!

I never even heard of Natalie Norwich/k.  I do vaguely recall having heard of Florence Stanley...

G.

dom, I have the same "go to" regarding Dan Curtis that you do when it comes to some of the more senselessly way-out plot swings.

Being a DS writer back at this time was a hard row to hoe.  Violet Welles seems to have been the most adroit when it came to rolling with the punches.  She worked as a ghost writer for Gordon so it's hard to know when she started helping with the scripts.  Thayer did re-write some of the dialogue and Joel Crothers flat out wrote whole scripts--we have testimony about this from back in the day.

G.

Thanks, Nicky!  I've wondered if the lore that the vampire can appear at Noon may have actually been a projection of what in some traditions is called the Fetch, an anergetic component of the human soul that supernatural beings in old European folklore are particularly adept at deploying to do their work.  The Fetch often takes the form of an animal.  It's unclear to me whether Dracula is supposed to be able to pop out of his coffin for the hour around the time of Noon and then return there, or manifest himself as an astral appearance (similar, perhaps, to how Julia "appeared" in 1897).

G.

I voted for NoDS. Even in its non-restored form I like it quite a bit better than hoDS (which I view as something of a guilty pleasure).

I think what makes it so exceptional is that it tells its own story.  The Lyndhurst setting, the cast we know and love so much, and the Bob Cobert score are elements that "make it DS" for me.

G.

Thanks, Gerard.  I'll have to look for that Art Carney episode you mention.  It sounds like a gem.

Best,

G.

Depp's Eddie Munster makeup and Trask wannabe line delivery ruins every scene he's in for me in this movie.  Sorry.

G.

I have to confess, apart from Cornelia Otis Skinner (playing a character very reminiscent of the original concept for Julia Hoffman) and the music which is lovely, I found this film distinctly lame upon my last viewing.  The ending in particular felt very anticlimactic to say the least.

If you've never seen it, I strongly advise trying to get it through Netflix or your local library.  Watch before you buy. 

I really need to get the new DVD of the cheapo 1957 Roger Corman shocker THE UNDEAD, definitely an inspiration for the whole Vicki-flashback-to-1795 thing.

cheers, H.