Fascinating Interview With DARK SHADOWS Writer Sam Hall

Last month, Jay Blotcher at TV Party interviewed 88-year-old, Sam Hall, who wrote for multiple soaps but is best known for his writing on the cult classic soap DARK SHADOWS. Hall, who lives in Rhinebeck, New York, is working on another soap for local television, SO YOU WANT TO LIVE IN THE COUNTRY.

Here's an excerpt of the interview.

Jay: Is Jonathan Frid [Barnabas Collins in DARK SHADOWS] available?

Sam: I’m sure he is! He is alive. He was very odd; he turned down the second Dark Shadows movie because he felt that the idea of appearing in two movies as a vampire would ruin his career in the theatre. Jonathan was never very realistic about his talent.

The outspoken Hall also weighed in on PASSIONS and Dan Curtis.

Jay: Had you heard about the [now-cancelled] NBC daytime drama PASSIONS that involved witches and magical elves, starring Juliet Mills?

Sam: Yes, I’ve heard about that. That kind of programming was founded on the success of DARK SHADOWS. But back then, the networks never really liked the program because it broke too many rules. And they didn't trust it; they thought it was a fake success. A success, but faddish. I [felt] the show did end prematurely since the man who owned it – he was the lifeblood of it – was a true madman. [Show creator and producer Dan Curtis] And he kept trying to make it scarier and scarier and scarier, until finally even I, who was writing it, couldn't follow his thought process.

Read the complete interview here.