Fans of the gothic soap opera can meet the stars of the show filled with vampires, ghosts, witches and romance
At the height of its TV success in the early 1970s, NBC’s gothic soap opera Dark Shadows inspired comic books, trading cards and a board game focused on its breakout character, the vampire Barnabas Collins.
It also inspired legions of fans to loiter outside the studio gates hoping for a glimpse of the stars. “There were hundreds of them outside the studio every day — they were groupies,” says James Storm, who played the ghost Gerard Stiles on the show and the 1971 spinoff feature film, Night of Dark Shadows. “I would park my old pickup on the street and when I got home, the tarp in the back pops up and here come four girls screaming ‘Gerard!’ ‘Gerard!’”
Storm will join his co-stars including David Selby, Jerry Lacy and Kathryn Leigh Scott at the 60th anniversary Diamond Jubilee Dark Shadows Festival at the Westin LAX Hotel from July 31 through August 2. What is being billed as the final cast reunion and fan gathering will include a costume contest, memorabilia auction, autograph sessions and discussions with the actors.
Tony-winning playwright John Logan, who wrote the films The Aviator, Skyfall and Michael, is working on vignettes the actors will perform during the expo. “He was one of those kids that ran home from school to watch the show,” says Scott, who played five characters in the stories set in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. “He got in touch with me and said he’d like to celebrate the anniversary. We co-wrote and co-published this amazing full-color Dark Shadows Legacy coffee table book together.”
The original cast of Dark Shadows in June, 1967Credit: Photo courtesy Dan Curtis Productions
Scott, the widow of Los Angeles founder Geoff Miller, was on the very first episode of the series in 1966. “We started the same year as Star Trek,” Scott says. “I always thought the audiences for that show and Dark Shadows were very smart and picked up on everything we were doing. They knew we based all our plot lines on classic literature like Wuthering Heights, The Picture of Dorian Gray and Jane Eyre.”
Producers mixed up that literary canon with ever more outrageous supernatural storylines. “We had werewolves and vampires and witches in the family tree,” Scott says. “It was a wonderful combination of fantasy, horror, thriller and romance.” After the show, Scott went on to star alongside legends like John Gielgud and Jimmy Stewart on stage in London and Paris before coming to Los Angeles, where she did even more film and TV work, including stints on Dallas and Dynasty. “As much as I loved doing Dark Shadows,” Scott says, “I didn’t want to be known just for horror films.”
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Storm wandered around Europe and Morocco after the show ended, looking for inspiration in the same souks that drew writers like Tennessee Williams to Tangier. Later, he had a star turn on another soap, The Bold and the Beautiful.
Reruns of Dark Shadows never went off the air (today it’s streaming on Amazon Prime, Tubi and Peacock) and it keeps gaining new fans. Thousands attended the first conventions in the 1970s with cast members signing autographs into the wee hours.
Storm remembers one day when he was mobbed by fans in the street. “Every actor should have that once in their career,” he says. “Fame is as fleeting as the day is long.