RUMBLE IN THE PENUMBRA: Joe Dante Vs. Cleveland Amory

Writer Cleveland Amory is best remembered for his work as a champion of animal rights. This is because, as a writer, Cleveland Amory kinda sucked.

The late TV Guide critic was a writer in the Hedda Hopper vein, which would have made him feel very much at home on Internet chatboards. You could spend you life reading this kind of "criticism" and come away knowing nothing about movies and television, how they work, or why we waste our time with them. For these people, "criticism" is all about bitchy, nihilistic wordplay, tarted up in run-on sentences in an attempt to mask feelings of insecurity. Amory's style of writing is the mean girl of criticism.

So, when a camp character like Cleveland Amory came face to face with a DARK SHADOWS, you can imagine things got nasty. In the Feb. 1, 1969, issue of TV Guide, Amory famously ripped the series in a futile attempt to understand its appeal.

"A few weeks ago, when we were down with the flu, we watched the show for a whole week," he wrote, presumably using the majestic plural. "Sick as we were - and were a sick boy - we were, compared with DARK SHADOWS, in the pink. But then a remarkable thing happened. At the end of the week, by which time we had decided that this series was, in our considered judgement, the worst in the history of entertainment, we found that when Saturday came and where was no show, we missed it."

A dare you to go back and count those commas.

Trust me. I smoke a pipe.

"And thus we arrived at a true understanding of the secret of DARK SHADOWS' success," he continued. "The worse it is, the more you'll love it." The rectal wart of a writer goes on to ridicule two children (David Henesy and Denise Nickerson, specifically) before fucking off to the next assignment ... which probably involved funding a clever way to get the word "poo" into a review of SCOOBY DOO. (Note: You can read the entire DARK SHADOWS piece HERE.)

But wait! A champion has emerged to defend the honor of DARK SHADOWS!

And he's brought back-up!

In 1971, two years after Amory 's piece was published in TV Guide, Castle of Frankenstein published a lengthy retort by none other than the future director of GREMLINS, Joe Dante. Still several years away from directing his first feature, HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD, Dante was a regular contributor to the magazine. His piece on DARK SHADOWS was published around the same time ABC was giving the series the boot, and it appears Dante was still a little pissed at Amory's review.

"TV Guide critic Cleveland Amory (both of him) opined that DARK SHADOWS is the all-time worst presentation 'in the history of entertainment.' This reveals Mr. Amory's lack of familiarity with the subject, since everybody's aware that Bert I. Gordon's VILLAGE OF THE GIANTS is the worst thing in the history of entertainment!"

VILLAGE OF THE GIANTS features a giant, toga-clad Beau Bridges go-go dancing. Just so you know.

"The fact is that DARK SHADOWS, a videotaped daily ABC-TV serial, is an oasis in the wasteland of TV's daytime programmed mental retardation," Dante wrote. Even though we're not supposed to use words like "mental retardation" as an insult these days, I appreciate the sentiment.  Dante's piece isn't built on a foundation of Amory-rage, though, and he mounts a sterling defense of the show on fairly technical levels. He applauds the show's use of color (which was actually a lot more tasteful than the LOOK! COLOR! palettes of other show's of the late 1960s) and argues that Barnabas Collins made a better hero than villain.

"(Jonathan) Frid makes a more persuasive hero than vampire, battling in true Van Helsing style against the various powers of Evil ... (and) manages to imbue the character with some dignity and even depth in the face of what is obviously limited rehearsal time," he wrote. "Despite the occasional mistakes, or maybe because of them, DS is highly enjoyable. The entire cast has been able and often better than the material, and the directors frequently work out some stylish effects and unexpectedly nice touches."

You can read Dante's entire piece HERE.

Ironically, Dante can also be partially blamed for the 2012 DARK SHADOWS film. In 1988, he turned down the offer to direct BATMAN. His reasons were noble: Dante said he identified more with the Joker than Batman, which he worried would handicap the film. Burton apparently felt otherwise and let Jack Nicholson run ramshackle of the production. The film's success elevated Burton's career and put him on the path to Collinwood. But that's OK. I'm not holding any grudges.

Against Joe Dante, anyway.

Joe Dante reviews DARK SHADOWS in 1971

DARK SHADOWS
House of Frankenstein, July 1971

By Joe Dante

TV Guide critic Cleveland Amory (both of him) opined that DARK SHADOWS is the all-time worst presentation '"in the history of entertainment." This reveals Mr. Amory's lack of familiarity with his subject, since everybody's aware that Bert I Gordon's VILLAGE OF THE GlANTS is the worst thing in the history of entertainment!

The fact is that DARK SHADOWS, a video- taped daily ABC-TV serial, is an oasis in the wasteland of TV's daytime mental retardation. Produced and created by Dan Curtis, who was responsible for the fine DR. JEKYLL & MR. HYDE special with Jack Palance, DS is soap-opera styled but with the accent on suspense and terror rather than the usual socio-sexual hang-ups.

Beginning in 1966 as a Gothic-type mystery serial aimed at teenage girls, it followed the misfortunes of pretty Victoria Winters (Alexandra Moltke) after taking a job as at the forbidding Collinswood estate in isolated Collinsport, New England, overseen by high-strung Elizabeth Stoddard (Joan Bennett), and being frightened by the expected transparently "unexplainable" events. This formula proved unrewarding, and the show was going nowhere when a 175-year-old vampire named Barnabas Collins, played by Jonathan Frid, was introduced experimentally. The character caught on and Curtis was quick to shift the emphasis from mystery to the supernatural, as Karloff's NBC THRILLER series had done a few years before much to its success.

Since then the program has been merchandising itself into a major industry, including an endless string Of paperback novels, one-shot publications, coloring books, record albums, and now, the boxoffice movie success, HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS.

The show itself has become a compendium of horror movie clichés, brought to a boil by concentrating all the mostly culled from old Universal pictures, upon one family. DS's characters have suffered more shocks and horrors than three generations Of Universal contract players; yet whenever the supernatural rears its shaggy head, they react as if it were intruding on an uneventful existence in Scarsdale.

Thus we have Barnabas, himself a reformed vampire who has been killed and revived at least a number of times, participating in various magical and monster-making experiments, shifting back and forth in time innumerable occasions, watched a friend turn into a werewolf, and seen Mrs. Stoddard return alive and unharmed from entombment alive after six weeks, greeting every occult plot twist with puzzlement and the inevitable “… it can't be possible!"

Such things contribute to the pleasantly redundant quality of the soap opera form, stretching each development into weeks or even months, enabling viewers to pick up on the story even after missing huge chunks. It took Barnabas six weeks to figure out that little David Collins (David Henesy) was under control of an evil spirit from the grave, forcing him to do his bidding like the time it made the boy string a wire across the staircase, tripping and half-killing his father— a neat trick for the kiddies at home to try. Of course, wise professor Stokes (Thayer David) knew what was going on at the outset, but, as usual, nobody paid much attention.

Along the way, Barnabas has been transformed into the show's hero, and frankly Frid makes a better, more persuasive hero than a vampire, battling in true Van Helsing style against the various powers of Evil, his vampiric past endowing him with a somewhat anti-hero cast. Frid manages to imbue the character with some dignity and even depth in the face of what is obviously limited rehearsal time.

Miss Moltke, who made no secret of her distress at her clichéd role (Honestly, Victoria is durnb”) , was written out some time ago by having her character disappear into the past, the heroine role assumed by both Nancy Barrett and Kathryn Leigh Scott. The nature of the program allows actors to be "killed" and return from time as ghosts, which at least provides a sort of job security.

Visually DARK SHADOWS is the best TV serial yet aired. The lighting and use of color are excellent, and the sheer number and variety of sets must set a opera record. The budget apparently doesn't allow for re-taping, so every fluff, camera misdirection, visible crew-member and production error left in, endowing the show with some of the excitement and human interest which made live TV so much fun back in the dear, dead Fifties. Nothing arouses audience empathy more than the sight of a harried actor groping for forgotten lines while trying to steal a discreet glimpse of the cue card.

Despite the occasional mistakes, or maybe because of them, DS is highly enjoyable. The entire cast has been able and often better than the material, and the directors frequently work out some stylish effects and nice touches.

The writers have borrowed liberally from DRACULA, FRANKENSTEIN, BRIDE OF
FRANKENSTEIN, THE WOLF MAN, THE PREMATURE BURIAL, THE UNDEAD, and
THE INNOCENTS, among others, giving the an affecting sub—classical Old/New  quality.

All concerned seem to be having a time, even when confused, and the fun is contagious.

Maybe not to Cleveland Amory, but to your COF reviewer at least. And, these days, who else can you trust?