99
« on: November 08, 2020, 06:20:23 PM »
A few weeks ago, I was talking to a friend who was involved in the production of the 2004 pilot. (Due to the need for confidentiality, I am unable to say more about the person's identity.) He told me that the original director assigned to the production had to bail at the last minute, and the new director they brought in knew REALLY, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about Dark Shadows--or seemingly anything horror related. To give examples, the new director, who evidently had not read the script, was under the impression in an early production meeting that Willie and Angelique were both vampires. When brought to a meeting with Alec Newman in costume, the director snapped "get rid of that stupid cane and that ring." It was the task of some supremely tactful individual to explain to the director the significance of these accessories in the Barnabas costume.
My friend said that working on the pilot was very frustrating--and the director was not good even in what he demanded of Blair Brown (and we've seen the results of that). On the up side, my friend did quite like Alec Newman, both as a person and what he did in the role.
He also shared some insights into the makeup and costuming of the 1991 series--he agreed to me that the Barnabas makeup was awful, both Vampire Barnabas especially in the 1790 scenes, and Old Barnabas. He said the makeup people assigned were not up to date and did not know what they were doing.
G.