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| Number |
491 |
| Timeline | |
| Narrator | |
| Writer | |
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| Broadcast | |
| Recorded |
May 20, 1968 |
| Video | |
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| We have 10 images of Dark Shadows 497 | |
Maggie puts on Josette Collins' earrings and feels compelled to go to the Old House.
Synopsis
Teaser
- There is some measure of safety while the light of day lingers over Collinwood. But when night comes so will the evil dream that has already struck terror unto the hearts and minds of five people. At the Old House on the Collins estate, a woman will make a great effort to keep the dream from finding a sixth victim, unaware that it is not within her power to keep the dream from spreading.
Mrs. Johnson returns from Boston and goes to the Old House before going to the main house. She tells Julia Hoffman that she has had the dream every night, and it is more terrifying each time. She knows she has to share the dream with David. She can't help herself, but is afraid. Julia prevents her from leaving the old house.
Act I
Julia tries to reason with Mrs. Johnson who gets hysterical and Julia slaps her. Julia tells Mrs. Johnson she's talked to Prof. Stokes about the dream. Julia promises to get in touch with him and find out if there's been any progress in figuring out how to break the dream. There's a knock at the door and it is David to tell Julia that his father wants to see her at Collinwood. She tells David she will be there in about a half an hour. Julia tells Mrs. Johnson to go home and get some rest, but prevents David from leaving with her by telling him she wants to show him a tape recorder and he might find it interesting to play with. Willie Loomis shows up and tells Julia he wants to talk to her downstairs. David goes outside to play while waiting for Julia to return with the tape recorder. Mrs. Johnson, instead of going to Collinwood, is waiting for David and takes him away, claiming she has something very important to tell him.
Act II At the Evans cottage, Joe Haskell shows up and tells Maggie he had taken her earrings and had them appraised. They are worth $15,000. He then checked with the police and said nothing that valuable has been reported stolen or lost. Joe does not like Maggie's new earrings and suspects that she got them from an admirer. Maggie puts the earrings on and stares in the mirror, almost trancelike. Maggie refuses to take the earrings off. She tells Joe he's acting childish and he leaves in anger. Josette's music plays as she looks in the mirror and she begins to remember. But what? Something about the Old House.
Act III
Willie is at the Old House, playing with an unloaded rifle when Maggie knocks on the door. Willie asks her why she has come and she says she's begun to remember things. Maggie says she knows Willie came to her house to warn her and they agree to be friends. She asks him who was trying to hurt her when he came to her house to warn her, and Willie lies, saying he doesn't know, he just had a feeling she needed protection. Willie asks Maggie for a date, but Maggie says Joe wouldn't like it. Willie says he has no friends. He makes her promise to think about going out with him. After Maggie leaves Willie grabs the rifle and makes threats against Joe.
Act IV
Mrs. Johnson sits by David's bed having told him of the dream. David has the dream and Willie is the beckoner. David goes through the door and hears the poem and Josette's music. He opens the first door and sees the skull, behind the second the skeleton bride, behind the third a giant bat, and behind the fourth a giant spiders web to which he becomes stuck. He screams for help and wakes.
Memorable quotes
- Joe: Well maybe we ought to just cancel our dinner.
- Maggie: Either that or find a place that serves baby food.
- Maggie: There is something important about them (the earrings). Something important. I remember - what do I remember? Something about the Old House but what? I've got to go there and find out. Yes, the Old House, the Old House.
- Willie: Through sight and sound and faceless terror, through endless corridors by trial and error, ahead a blazing light does burn, and one door leads to the point of return.
Dramatis personae
- Joel Crothers as Joe Haskell
- Grayson Hall as Julia Hoffman
- Clarice Blackburn as Sarah Johnson
- John Karlen as Willie Loomis
- Kathryn Leigh Scott as Maggie Evans
- David Henesy as David Collins
Background information and notes
Production
- This episode was recorded out of broadcast sequence. The previous episode to be recorded was 501.
- This is one of only four episodes in the series to be recorded on the day before broadcast, along with 505, 507 and 508.
- David's room has clearly been set up ready for the dream curse sequence as everything is black.
- There are no cast or crew credited for this episode and the end music is abruptly cut off as the copyright page fades.
- The sets used in this episode are The Old House foyer and drawing room, outside the Old House, the Evans cottage living room, and the dream room.
Story
- DREAM SEQUENCE: David experiences the dream curse. He is the sixth victim. He opens four doors revealing a skull, a skeleton bride, bats, and a giant spider's web. The beckoner is Willie.
- INTERNAL MONOLOGUE: Maggie: Remembering something about the Old House.
- TIMELINE: Day 208 takes place. Mrs. Johnson has been experiencing the effects of dream curse for "several days", (Julia told it to her in 490). It was the "other night" when Willie went to the Evans cottage to warn Maggie, (occurred in 483).
Bloopers and continuity errors
- One of Maggie's earrings falls out while she argues with Joe. Kathryn Leigh Scott tries to cover it with her hand.
- As Julia goes to open the door when David arrives at the Old House, a boom mic shadow passes over Mrs. Johnson and the set.
- When Mrs. Johnson approaches David outside the Old House, he says to her, "I thought you were going to the Old House, back home.”
- There are a number of never-to-be-answered questions in the plot of this episode. What did Roger want to see Julia about? What did Willie want to talk to Julia about in the basement? What was Julia's reaction when she came back upstairs (supposedly with the tape recorder) and found David gone? She must have known he would go back to Collinwood and see Mrs. Johnson; was she at all concerned?