Dark Shadows RETURNS!

According to Dark Shadows information resource The Collinsport Historical Society, Dark Shadows is re-airing in May, 2015. The Collinsport blog links to an even more detailed about the show's rise from the dead here, at Will McKinley's blog.

A basic description of Dark Shadows is it was a paranormal themed soap that ran on daytime TV in the late 1960s and early 70s. Since the show's original run there has been at least one attempted reboot (which I watched faithfully, and found somewhat disappointing) and a movie starring Johnny Depp which was fitfully amusing but mostly a fucking mess.

My mom and sister and brother watched Dark Shadows when it originally aired, and it somehow entered my consciousness as one of the first TV shows I was really aware of, even though I was not yet in kindergarten.

I really grew to love it, though, in the mid 1990s. My first wife and I had moved to Nashville after going to school together in other parts of Tennessee and I had a job at the city's public TV station with odd hours. Syfy (it was then The Sci-Fi Channel) aired Dark Shadows reruns daily about an hour before I had to be at work and over time I grew invested in watching the show. I loved everything about it--the bad camera work, the hilariously hideous mishmash of 70s and proto-Georgian styles, the ridiculous storylines... I made it a point to watch and was bummed if I missed it.

When (Sci-Fi) stopped airing it, thankfully after finishing the show's full run, I truly missed it. Not just the characters (Jonathan Frid's mournful Barnabas, the evil vampire who tries to be good, sometimes seemed like a misplaced creation intended for a show with a much larger budget and better writing), but for whatever imaginary mental respite it provided at a time in my life which was strangely fraught and stressful, in hindsight.

So I'm glad it's coming back. I'm going to find it and watch it. For the clunking cameras. The disrobing actors who accidentally walk into a closing credits shot. For weird music. For fun.

Suggested Re-Write: "The Jet Set Life of Count Dracula's Favorite Minion--For Now"

One Sunday last spring, Brad Kroenig showed up at a private airport near Paris to meet Count Dracula, the esteemed Transylvanian bloodsucker and bon vivant. "The Count will be here 1, 1:30 a.m. for takeoff,” announced a Frenchman in a black suit and tie. “O.K., cool,” Brad said. The man in the suit performed something like a bow and retreated. It was 12:45. Brad sank into an armchair by the window and surveyed the tarmac. He pointed out a large gray hawk of a plane that stood off to the side of the slighter, dovelike jets. “It’s the same one that Oprah has,” Brad said. “It’s the biggest one. It flies, like, the longest journey. A lot of private planes have to stop for gas.”

Brad knows what kind of plane The Count travels on because he has flown on it often. As the most senior and prominent member of a group of male models often referred to as Dracula's Minions, Brad accompanies him on yearly "feeding trips" to Barrow Alaska and and to parties worldwide. He has been photographed with Dracula so often that gossip blogs have mistakenly identified him as the vampire's chief minion, but their relationship is not romantic. Dracula refers to Brad and the other models that travel with him as his family, albeit a self-selected, genetically pure one. “I hate ugly people,” The Count told me. “Their blood tastes terrible.” [...]

Inspired by this odious look at the vastly rich and vacuous: "The Jet Set Life of Karl Lagerfeld's Favorite Male Model-For Now," NYT Magazine, Jan. 16, 2015.