I've wondered for years whether they moved the origins of Barnabas story to the 1790s because of the availability of costumes from the 18th century.   I know that sounds silly, but I keep wondering about that.

I believe there's a scene that aired less than a month before the start of 1795 where Barnabas is talking to Julia about Josette, and he goes into the whole thing with Jeremiah again, and she gets him to admit that Josette never loved him.  At this point, they did have the same writers who wound up writing 1795.  So my conclusion is that, as usual, it was DC and nobody else who was responsible for the abrupt switch in plan.

Since 1795 keeps getting touted as the best of all DS' storylines (not my personal opinion), I guess most fans would approve of DC's decisions, despite the substantial errors in continuity!

G.

What do you want to know?

Born in Medford (a suburb of Boston)--real name was David Thayer Hersey--family made money in paper mill biz.

Went to Harvard and helped found Brattle Theatre.  Was in the same circle as poet Frank O'Hara and artist Edward Gorey in the late 1940s.  Did lots and lots of theatre, including Shakespeare and classical roles.

Had lots of character roles in films, but also had big career doing voiceovers for radio commercials in the Sixties.

Married film actress Valerie French.  The marriage didn't last, but apparrently their friendship did.

Alex Moltke Isles mentions that he carried a torch for her while they were working on Shadows together.  Presumably, his warmth helped her endure some of the difficult scenes they had together in his first storyline.  Jonathan Frid mentioned that even though Thayer was basically the same age as himself and Louis, he was very avuncular and caring of all of them.  Grayson knew Thayer professionally before Shadows, and she was a friend of his wife's.  KLS enjoyed Thayer's company a lot.  There's a wonderful series of photos of Thayer and her out antiquing taken by Ben Martin during the Sixties, in the original "My Scrapbook Memories of DS"--I wish those photos had been retained in the revision.

Some of his post Shadows work is really worth checking out.  My favorite is his version of Nero Wolfe.  When will it be released on any format???

Steve

Criseyde, that's a gorgeous image, and the perfect way to celebrate Selby-day!

G.

Belated but warm birthday wishes to a fabulous writer, wonderful researcher, sterling librarian, and all around great gal!

Au reservoir,

G.

Thayer David is really good in Savages, which also stars Chris Pennock.  The movie itself is very odd but I enjoyed seeing it.

Not a film, but I really enjoyed Lara's guest role on Kojak: The Night Stalker.  I think the title of her episode is something like The Trevi Connection.  Nina Foch is in it, as well, and the episode sort of winks at both the dark Forties B-horror films in which Nina Foch got her start, and Lara Parker's work on Dark Shadows.

Satan in High Heels is one of my top ten movies of all time, for Grayson's performance and for the look and feel of the movie--great soundtrack, too.  She was nominated for an Oscar in Iguana, and none of those big H'wood stars got noms, so I always cackle a bit when I think of that.  It's cute that Gargoyles was mentioned; I was just thinking of that film the other day.  I also love GH's moments in Adam at Six A. M. (she plays Michael "Mikey" Douglas' busybody, meddling aunt); End of the Road (short but bittersweet); and the DC produced telefilm, The Great Ice Ripoff, in which she's quietly effective as the wife of a retiring detective.

I really wish "Back to Back" would be made available.  It's a 52 minute drama shot in color in 1965. Grayson played the imperious, snobbish head of an exclusive resort, opposite Shelley Winters and Jack Hawkins as a pair who were trying to get jobs on her staff.  It was shown in Oct. 1965 on the "Bob Hope Chrysler Theatre" show.  My attempts at finding a copy have gone absolutely nowhere.

Joan Bennett's scenes in Suspiria are fun--I find that film otherwise unwatchable, but I'm in a small minority on that--most people rate it as a classic.

There's more... but who knows where the time goes?

G.

On a related topic, if there's ever news about SoapNet airing the 1982-83 episodes of OLTL on which Grayson appeared, I would appreciate knowing about it (and discussing arrangeing to get copies of tapes!!).

Good luck everybody--hope DS has a good prospect of finding a new home on SoapNet.  It does need a home on current broadcast television.

G.

Hi Connie and Rainey, I'd love to see old episodes of Where the Action is!  From voiceovers on the early MPI collectors series tapes, I gather it followed DS at 4 in the afternoon.  They may have promoted DS on that show's commercial breaks during June 1966 and that may be how you found out about it.

I love watching old rock and roll shows from that era.  I just got some 1967 tapes of a German show called the Beat Club and, believe me, the groovy threads those guys were wearing made *me* shriek, though perhaps not in the way you intended.

cackling obscenely,

Gothick

For the most part, I agree with your estimation of this pilot episode.

It's OK as entertainment.  For me, it just doesn't work as Dark Shadows.

I thought the real badness of the series came in the actual episodes, particularly when they moved to 1790 and started flashing backwards and forwards to then and the 1990 story.  This was a bee that flew out of the bonnet of some tiresome executive at NBC.  Apparently, he thought it would make the pace more exciting.  It didn't.

Agree absolutely about Jean Simmons as Liz, and Roy Thinnes as Roger isn't much better, although very good on the eyes I must say.

I don't remember Michael Cavanaugh at all, sorry to say.

S.