Close Encounters of the Celebrity Kind...
Lara Parker is Happy to Remain in the "Shadows"
Exclusive KATM Interview (Originally Conducted 9-07)
by Richard Knight, Jr.
Original "Dark Shadows" cast member Lara Parker today with the famous portrait of her in character as the powerful witch
Angelique, the cover of Parker's latest "Dark Shadows" novel tie-in, and a still from the show with Jonathan Frid as Barnabas.
KNIGHT AT THE MOVIES (KATM): Is it Lara or Laura?  Am I saying that correctly?

LARA PARKER (LP):  Not “Laura,” it’s like “Barbara” – “Lar-uh.”  My agents gave me that name when I started acting and I’ve had fits
over it ever since (laughs).

KATM:  What’s your real first name?

LP:  You’ll be surprised – it’s Lamar.

KATM:  Wow, unusual.

LP:  It’s actually a family name.  I was named after my great-great-great grandfather which is something they do to girls in the
south, they give them first names that are family names and it was a very big deal.  He was a Supreme Court justice.

KATM:  Actually, that’s rather beautiful.

LP:  Yes, all my friends and everyone I know, my children and everyone, think of me as Lamar but to the public I’m Lar-uh Parker
(laughs).

KATM:  I have a personal reason to be excited to talk with you today.

LP:  I’m excited to talk to you!

KATM:  Thank you.  My partner is a die hard “Dark Shadows” fan.  He goes back to the very first episode and made me promise to
send his regards.

LP:  Well we had some very faithful fans back then and I know how he must feel.

KATM:  Its 41 years since the beginning, right?

LP:  I don’t think about it so you’ll have to add it up (laughs).

KATM:  It’s been awhile, shall we say.

LP:  Yes.  I think it went off the air in ’71, ’72 so…I’d have to get out the books and look it up because I forget but it has been a
long time.

KATM:  Are you amazed by the enduring popularity?

LP:  Well you know, when I first left New York after “Dark Shadows” went off the air and I came to Hollywood to become a big movie
star – because “Dark Shadows” had been my first professional job – and all I wanted to do was shed the relationship with a vampire
soap opera and shed the persona of a witch – and I worked a lot in television and in film and they started having conventions.  Well,
they had to drag me to the conventions because I really didn’t want to go back in time to something that I’d done earlier.  But as
the years went by and I didn’t become a movie star (laughs) “Dark Shadows” became more important in my life and I began to
really value the conventions and think of them as something I should be proud of rather than something I should try to forget about
and now that they’ve been going on so long, I guess I feel that I’m really fortunate that I was part of the show.  

The interesting thing is – and this is how life is – Jonathan Frid who played the vampire came to the last convention (August of 2007)
and Jim Pierson who runs the conventions put together a half hour compilation of his many wonderful scenes and he was just
staggeringly effective.  He was amazing.  He took out all the scenes where he forget his lines and looked at the teleprompter and he
just captured those moments when he was really effective and I turned to Kathryn Leigh Scott and I said, “You know ‘Dark Shadows’
gets better every year – how can this be?” and she said, “Because there’s never been anything like it.”  Also, so much of television –
not HBO – so much of network television is so bad that in comparison, “Dark Shadows” looks really, really good.  Plus, you know
when you get that distance that years bring you start to develop an affection for something.  The tape did something beautiful to our
faces, it enhanced us.  Something happened when we were taped that film doesn’t do and that video doesn’t do.  I don’t know what
it is—

KATM:  I think there’s a real immediacy about it—

LP:  I’m just talking about the picture itself.

KATM:  Right, right, that’s what I think as well.

LP:  It kind of glitters.  I don’t know what it is but it seems like old photographs to me.  There’s an ambiance to the way it was
filmed and it was filmed very shadowy.  Everybody’s face was made up with shadows.  Our faces were sort of painted on by the make-
up artists, the shadowing and the eyes were so enhanced so everyone kind of looks very old fashioned and it has a certain
emotional tug to it.  My feeling about it at this point – especially with Johnny Depp saying that he wants to get involved – is that I’m
actually very proud of it.  So I’ve gone the whole spectrum from wanting to have nothing to do with it to now saying, “Gee, I guess we
did create something that was special and very, very unique and unusual.”  I think all of us are at the “Gee whiz stage.”

KATM:  Well that’s wonderful.  So when you heard that Johnny Depp was planning on doing a movie and I understand from speaking
with Jim (Pierson) that he intends to play Barnabas – you were thrilled, excited, stopped and said, “Oh, I don’t know…,” what?

LP:  Oh I think he’ll be marvelous.  I’ll tell you why: first of all there are many movies that are in development that never get made
so we’re just thrilled; all of the cast is thrilled.  Since I’ve started writing novels – and I’m working on my third “Dark Shadows” novel
for Tor (Books) – it will be very good for me if the movie gets made because the books will sell more so from a personal standpoint
I’m really delighted.  I also feel that the two attempts to re-do “Dark Shadows” were too serious.  I think that Johnny Depp will bring
a sense of humor; he’s kind of a rascal and it will be a different interpretation of Barnabas but I think it will hit more levels.  It won’t
just be the somber character.

KATM:  That would be interesting.

LP:  I think that’s what Jonathan Frid did.  I think being a Shakespearean actor I think he was able to work on several different
levels and the campy quality and the absurdity came out in his performance.  Partially because it was filmed live on tape so we were
all very tense when we were doing it (laughs).  I think that he (Johnny Depp) will bring something to it that will be really remarkable.  
He might be the best Barnabas of all and he said that as a little boy, “I’m going to play that part some day” so it’s something he’s
wanted to do for a long time apparently.

KATM:  Which bodes well for the movie getting made.

LP:  Well I think that it will be marvelous and I think there could be not one but many made.  There are many, many stories over
five years of “Dark Shadows.”

KATM:  Have they talked about original cast members appearing in the film – doing cameos or something – I know it’s probably way
too early to ask this, they probably haven’t even written a script yet.

LP:  No, they haven’t written a script.  All of us would be delighted to be included but we don’t expect to be but the fans would love it
and we have a lot of fans.  We have a huge fan base and when a mailing goes out its like 40 or 50,000 and a couple thousand show
up every year at the conventions.  When I look at well my book has sold, my second book which is simply a TV tie-in, I mean I
would not expect anyone to buy it would wasn’t a “Dark Shadows” fan, I realize that there are a lot of fans out there and they would
love to see the original actors in the movie.  They would get such a kick out of it and I think that this was Dan Curtis’ invention when
he did the nighttime filmed attempt to re-do “Dark Shadows.”  I think he wanted to use us all at some point but it didn’t last.  But as
I say, none of us have any expectations, we just wish the project well.

KATM:  It’s sort of interesting – the show itself has become the vampire (laughs) – nothing can kill it.

LP:  I know, I know, it’s the show that refuses to die and there are very good reasons for that as I’m sure you partner Jim knows.  
I'm often asked, “To what do you attribute the show’s notoriety and its staying power?”  I mean it really is unbelievable – it came
out on vhs and then again on DVD.

KATM:  Jim taped everyone of them off the Sci-Fi channel and then bought all the vhs tapes and now we have them all on DVD.  
We've spent more on “Dark Shadows” than I can calculate (laughs).  But actually it’s wonderful to have somebody in your life who
has this kind of love because every birthday, every anniversary—

LP:  (laughing)  You know what to give him!

KATM:  Oh yes, so we have a treasure area full of “Dark Shadows” memorabilia and it just delights him.  It still permeates so many
areas of his life – he listens to these new audio CDs in his car and puts the DVDs in while he’s cooking.

LP:  That’s delightful.  You know we sit there and sign autographs and meet the fans and this is after all these years, we do this
every single summer and so many new fans show up and they’re just astonished they haven’t heard about the conventions and they
can’t wait to just walk up and say, “I used to run home from school to watch you and I hated you but I loved you, too and you got
me through the most difficult time in my life.”  You know that’s really set me to thinking about, “What is it about supernatural
characters that really appeal to kids that are perhaps in adolescence having difficulty dealing with it?”  

I’ve never really been able to figure it out but I know that it’s true that people with powers to manipulate others and to retaliate
when harm has been inflicted upon them – it’s very exciting to powerless feeling adolescents to imagine themselves being able to
cast spells or bite people and there is a sexual element to the vampires – I mean a big one – and that’s part of it, too and that’s
when adolescents are discovering their sexuality.  And it wasn’t just adolescents, it was also a lot of lonely housewives at home who
turned on “Dark Shadows” and fell in love with a vampire.  So it has an interesting appeal.  I attribute “Dark Shadows” real value to
the fact that they gleaned from all of the great gothic, romantic classics – no only “Dracula” and “Frankenstein” – but starting with
the girl on the train going to the house in the woods—

KATM:  Oh yes, very “Jane Eyre.”

LP:  Yes, “Jane Eyre” and “Wuthering Heights” with the crazy person in the locked up room.

KATM:  Hints of “Rebecca” here and there.

LP:  Oh yes.  I’m sure the writers sat down and said, “Okay, it’s time to do “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” or okay, it’s time for “The
Picture of Dorian Gray” or which of the great classics can we steal the story from and re-do on “Dark Shadows” next?”  That of course
creates reverberations.  I mean, they even did pieces of Shakespeare.  It packed a wallop because of that and of course, most of
the fans were not aware of that.  They weren’t readers of the classics but the staying power of the classics exists in “Dark Shadows”
and I think it gave it a wonderful kind of romantic feel.  Dan Curtis used to say, “This is not horror.  This is gothic romance.”

KATM:  Yes.  When I spoke to Jim Pierson he was very quick to point that out.  So, you had
your second book come out this year?

LP:  Last summer (July 2006).

KATM:  Will there be another book?

LP:  Yes, I’m writing another one.

KATM:  Ooh, more Angelique.

LP:  Well I don’t know whether Angelique will be featured very much in this one.  I have all those characters and I’m kind of at liberty
to find stories that continue their sagas.  I’m submitting an outline now to Tor (Books) and hopefully they’ll like it.  I got kind of
sidetracked because I started teaching again.  I teach English at Santa Monica City College but it’s so time consuming to teach.

KATM:  It must be astounding when a student comes in and sees Angelique at the podium.

LP:  (laughs)  They have no idea.  I try to kind of stay away from that because in Los Angeles there are so many mini celebrities
that it’s kind of boring.  I mean (laughs) they’re so young, I mean if anything, there parents would have loved it but they have no
idea.

KATM:  Well this may change if the Johnny Depp movie gets made.

LP:  I know, wouldn’t that be great?  I hope it happens.
NOTE:  This interview was originally conducted in September of 2007 as part of a story I did for the Chicago Tribune focusing on the
announcement that Johnny Depp intended to make a feature film of
Dark Shadows, the gothic soap opera that originally aired from
1966-1971.  As is often the case, the story allowed me to use little of Parker's interview so here it is now, a year later for fans of
the show to enjoy.  I also wanted to time the posting of this full interview to coincide with
the final release on DVD of the last of the
"Dark Shadows" original episodes from MPI Home Video.  Parker played Angelique, a powerful witch on the show who was so
frustrated by her unrequited love for Barnabas Collins (Jonathan Frid) that she turned him into a vampire.  This was but one of a
myriad of storylines that Parker's character was involved in throughout the series.  Parker makes for a delightful interview -
forthright, relaxed, funny, and filled with insight about the enduring popularity of the phenomenon that "Dark Shadows" became.  
Excerpts: