Famous Monsters of Filmland, May/June 2012- Tim Burton Steps into the Shadows
Title: Tim Burton Steps into the Shadows
Author: Justin Beahm
Publication: Famous Monsters of Filmland
Issue: May/June 2012
Tim Burton’s 13th birthday fell on a weekday in 1970—a Tuesday, to be precise. After trudging through another uninspiring school day, the young artist sprinted to his Burbank, California home, plating himself in front of the television. A quick Dr. Frankenstein-inspired twist of a knob brought the box to electric life, fading in to reveal the chiseled face of a ghost named Gerard Stiles forcing a terrified David Collins backwards across a room. Burton grinned from ear to ear as he navigated the following thirty minutes of his favorite television show, DARK SHADOWS, which, unbeknownst to him at the time, was helping cement a foundation on which he would one day build a bizarre cinematic empire.
“I was in the generation that ran home to watch DARK SHADOWS, which might be why I was such a lousy student.”‘ the director laughs of his afternoon preoccupation withCollinwood Manor and its inhabitants. “There was nothing like it on television.’” Nothing, indeed. Werewolves, vampires, graveyards, and haunted mansions were hardly the stuff of naptime filler for stay-at-home moms, but these genre staples were the lifeblood of ABC’s surprise hit soap, not to mention core imagination vitamins for dreamy-eyed aspiring filmmaker Burton. “Vampires in the afternoon? Who would have thought?” he considers.
In reality, the show’s appeal did have a relatively short first run as far as soap operas go,
