What fun to have you back, my dear.  And in fine form, too!

I quite enjoy Blaisedon.  I actually recall the original broadcast back in 1969.  It was shown in a nighttime slot and I recall the TV Guide entry stating it was a pilot for a series that wasn't picked up.  This has been discussed in at least one of the PomPress books, as well, I'm sure.

It was funny how much of it came back to me from that single 1969 viewing when I first saw it as an adult.  For example, when the Cal Bellini character was opening the mummy-case, I knew there was going to be dialogue about death by fire in the script that had a point to it.

Cal Bellini was good.  Stroka would have brought a creepy edge to the character.  Dusay and Mathews deserve marks for running with material they probably found, to say the least, a bit odd when it wasn't hackneyed.

Thayer really stole the show in his role.  Louis was divine, what little we saw of him.  I love Bob Cobert's music no matter what is going on onscreen.

I don't own this, but have seen it a couple of times, mostly at friends' homes.  I've pondered ordering it over the years.

Best, Steve

Excellent work, dear!  I look forward to having a good look at it one of these days.  Nice to have the scan up of the one article.

Congrats, Steve

Night Gallery was a wonderful series, although it frequently led to sleepless nights when I watched it as a 13 year old.  I well remember Elsa Lanchester's wonderful turn in Green Fingers--simply superb.  They don't make TV like this anymore.  I still cringe whenever I recall the earwig story.  It was played with such subtlety, and wonderful whispers of the dark secrets of African Witchcraft.

Grayson's episode was filmed, I believe, in early August 1970.  She was given a few days off DS to do this, which is why she disappears for a bit (after being on nearly every day for about 4 weeks!) soon after the return from 1995.  She had to take a redeye flight back from "the Coast" and stumble into the studio to tape an episode the day she came back from doing Night Gallery.  The episode was first shown almost exactly 23 years ago--around Dec. 31, 1970.

She was told that the wig she wore in this had been worn by Rita Hayworth previously--I'm not sure in which film.  I've always thought that she kept that wig and wore it as Carlotta in NoDS but perhaps DC sprang for one of a similar cut.  It certainly did frame her face with an elegant, haunting beauty.

G.

Morgan=terrible manners, awful hair, dimples that could swallow lower Manhattan...

endowment of DEATH...

definitely would not kick him out of bed for eating crackers... though I might give him a tube of superglue cleverly disguised as lipbalm... sheesh, all that chatter could get on ANYONE's nerves.

Gothick the Crew-ell and eee-VIL

Hmmmm... in today's montage, it looks as if Quentin is pulling Gabriel in for a sweet, brotherly smooch on the lips.

Isn't that lovely!  Sweetness and light reign over the Great House... and All Who Live There.

just something that made me twinkle,

G.

David Hemmings was one of the more understated iconic male actors of the Sixties.  Two other performances from him that I enjoy are in Barbarella, and in the title role of Alfred the Great, a hard-to-find film that I saw on TV way back in the Seventies and found moody and resonant.

He did a lot of great work--perhaps TCM will do a retrospective on him.

G.

Greetings,

thanks to a friendly tip from Darren and the MB (see NoDS thread), I've been reading the NoDS script published in the DS Movies book back in 1999.

When I first saw NoDS (on the CBS television broadcast around 1973, I think--the movie only played my town for one week, and it was when we were away on a trip), my "read" on the story was that Angelique really was a Witch. Her death certainly could be regarded as an injustice (not to mention being technically illegal--not to put too fine a point on it, in the events depicted in the complete script, she was lynched by a mob consisting of a stump preacher and some deluded local stable boys, under the direction of certain of the local gentry who had a score to settle with the lady).  I was surprised when I began to read online fandom back in the mid 90s to find that many fans' take on it was that Angelique, although a scheming adultress, was technically innocent of Witchcraft.

My current reading of Sam Hall's screenplay reinforces my original impression, that we're meant to understand that Angelique isn't just "witchy," but actually a Witch.  Many of the scenes that clarify her "uncanny" abilities of course fell victim to the cutting room floor.

I hope to go into more detail later on, but am just curious what other fans of NoDS think about the matter.

G.

Darren, I'm so sorry about the skeleton discovery sequence--it always seems to be the way with these things...

And MB, thanks for the tip about the Movies book.  I do own that book, but had never bothered to look at the screenplays very closely, since I'd already read the other draft of NoDS, for one.  And looking through hoDS, I'm shocked at the jejune, listless quality of much of the dialogue--the cut scene where Roger, Liz and Barn visit the OH for the first time, for instance.  VERY ho hum.  Makes me wonder just how much time Gordon & Sam had to crank out that script--not much, I gather.

I think I found the "piano scene."  I found a sequence that is a flashback to 1810 (and Lara wears the dress from the photo on the cover of the DS Music book--darn, am I sorry I never purchased that book!), with Parker, Selby, and Diana Millay.  Truly fabulous.  Since all 3 are alive and well, I don't see why we couldn't have a "staging" of that scene with the three reading their dialogue to the recovered footage.

I'll have to continue reading and see whether it was made more clear in this revised script the complicated idea GH explained in her notes about Carlotta not just keep the ghost alive, but actually experiencing Ang's orgasms when she was with Q!  I quite liked that idea... sooo kinky!

G.