Episode 361 was virtually a one-woman show, featuring Grayson Hall as Julia Hoffman, MD. Julia was being tormented by haunted house-style effects resulting from her involvement with a supernatural entity. The script, by Ron Sproat, was largely a recycling of an episode Sproat had written for Never Too Young, the soap opera that ran on ABC at 4 PM before Dark Shadows premiered.
Episode 658 consisted largely of a one-man show, featuring Joel Crothers as fisherman Joe Haskell. Joe was being tormented by haunted house-style effects resulting from his involvement with a supernatural entity. The script, by Gordon Russell, owed a good deal to Sproat’s work on #361.
Episode 897 ended with a long scene that amounted to a one-woman show, featuring Marie Wallace as antique shop owner Megan Todd. Megan was being tormented by haunted house-style effects resulting from her involvement with a supernatural entity. The script, by Violet Welles, drew from both #361 and #658.
Many fans consider #361 to be The Worst Episode of Dark Shadows, and many consider Megan’s turn at the end of #897 to be The Worst Scene on Dark Shadows. To the extent that #658 is remembered at all, it is because it is one of Crothers’ last appearances on the show. The memory of this fine and well-loved actor makes the fans so weepy that no one can be very harsh about his final star turn.
Today, the second half of the episode is virtually a one-woman show featuring Nancy Barrett as heiress Carolyn Collins Stoddard. Carolyn is being tormented by haunted house-style effects resulting from her involvement with a supernatural entity. The script, by Gordon Russell, recycles elements of #361, #658, and #897.
Russell was usually one of the most careful writers on Dark Shadows, but this one is remarkably shoddy. Carolyn and her mother, matriarch Liz, are staying at the home of a woman named Angelique. Angelique tells them that she has to drive to the airport to pick up her husband, and that she will be away for “several hours.” A couple of minutes later, Liz is also called away, and she tells Carolyn that she is sure “Angelique will only be gone an hour or so.”
Worse, all the action of the episode is completely, flagrantly unnecessary. The calls that leave Carolyn alone in the house are part of a monster’s scheme to get at Carolyn. But Liz is the monster’s loyal servant- if he had told her to bring Carolyn to him, she would gladly have done so.
Carolyn’s torments aren’t quite a monodrama, since they are interrupted by a couple of brief scenes with other actors. But one of those is a dream sequence in which she talks to the monster while we see him silhouetted in darkness. The interaction between them is so limited he may as well be a recorded voice. She also has a few interactions with Angelique’s husband. Since he is played by Geoffrey Scott, he may as well be a cardboard standee.
One advantage this episode has over #361 is that Nancy Barrett was excellent at screaming, second only to Clarice Blackburn in her ability to produce a true blood-curdler. Grayson Hall, accomplished as she was, had asthma and was physically incapable of controlling the timbre of her voice when she raised its volume above a certain level. Sproat’s script for #361 required Julia to scream several times, and every time she tried it Hall emitted a croaking sound that raised a bad laugh. Miss Barrett’s closing scream today, by contrast, really puts the “opera” in “soap opera,” it sounds great.
This is one of the few episodes with no scenes on the estate of Collinwood, and one of very few to take place primarily in a location many miles from the village of Collinsport.
There’s also an interesting moment when Angelique claims to have met Liz and Carolyn’s distant cousin Barnabas while they were both living in England. Barnabas never lived in England, that’s a lie he has been telling his relatives to conceal the fact that he is a recovering vampire who hasn’t left Maine since George Washington was president. Liz is part of the current supernatural storyline and Carolyn has at various times known all about Barnabas, so we don’t expect to be reminded that he’s still peddling the “cousin from England” bit.
Dark Shadows Commentary 