On this day in Horror History, DARK SHADOWS premiered on television in 1966.

Happy 60th anniversary to Dark Shadows, the daytime soap opera that began as a tale of mild gothic intrigue in a Maine fishing village before transforming into an ongoing story of vampires, witches, ghosts, werewolves, warlocks, phoenixes, mad scientists, seances, curses, possession, obsession...

⚠️ BREAKING! ⚠️ Exactly 60 years to the day since the first broadcast of Dark Shadows on the ABC network comes news of a special audio drama release. Click https://bgfn.sh/dsr to find out more. Some things never die...

Today is World Refugee Day. Here’s a poem called ‘Refugees’.

Ghostly radio script submitted. More ghosts waiting in the wings.

An incredible career, all the way back to The Mary Tyler Moore Show. What a legacy of laughter.

Ticket booked to see Reece Shearsmith talking about his memoir, Things I Took From The Dark, this October in Edinburgh.

Currently reading: Actually just finished this one... Solace House, from the author of the magnificent The Apparition Phase, is another very smart, engaging, atmospheric novel with characters that live and a real sense of time and place, and of dread.

Yesterday's delivery from Severin Films. Slightly odd but rather nice to see my name onscreen in the end credits as one of the backers of the excellent and moving Children of The Wicker Man documentary.

“It’s a long way from anywhere…” Just heard that Dave Greenslade has died. Currently greatly enjoying again his superbly witty and inventive scores for A Very Peculiar Practice on BBC4. His work on Gangsters too was brilliant, both of and ahead of its time. “We’ll always love you.” RIP.

It's 90 years today since M.R. James died. His influence, of course, not only lives on but thrives. And by sheer chance the script I'm working on at this moment is deeply indebted to his work - to one story in particular - and to his legacy as a storyteller.

Today's arrival. Eureka's new Blu-ray of the earliest Vincent Price film I remember seeing as a kid. Vincent, Peter Cushing, Robert Quarry, Linda Hayden, and Michael Parkinson take up residence in the Madhouse... their host, Doctor Death!

With RTD gone, now we'll never get the answer to such mysteries as why a UNIT helicopter had to drop off the tanker containing Salt to be driven by lorry to UNIT HQ when UNIT HQ has a very prominent heliport sticking out of it.

I just backed SIR SHERLOCK - The Sickle and the Sea on @kickstarter.com www.kickstarter.com/projects/152...

Last night's cinema trip: Obsession, which deserves all of the breakout success it's enjoying. It manages to be both hugely funny and terribly sad, and also effectively scary. A note perfect cast with a central performance from Inde Navarrette that is blisteringly luminous. Fantastic!

RIP Anthony Head. www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKgV...

Today's very welcome arrival from the House of Hammer.

Richard O'Brien as his diabolically delightful alter ego, Mephistopheles Smith in his show 'Disgracefully Yours', which was playing at the Edinburgh Fringe. This performance was broadcast on August 14th 1995 as part of the series Edinburgh Nights. www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydG1...

Neil Innes, John Halsey, and Ricky Fataar appeared on VH1 in 1996 to promote the release of The Rutles' Archeology album. www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGfp...

Steve Martin's introduction to Monty Python's 20th anniversary special 'Parrot Sketch Not Included'. This excerpt includes the 'Satanism' segment, which was omitted from all home video and DVD releases, and from repeat showings on satellite and cable. www.youtube.com/watch?v=_teQ...

Thanks to a company called FutureNetwork, who seem to be handling a lot of the much missed Network Distributing's stock, I've added the facsimile script of Hammer House of Horror episode The Silent Scream to the Two Faces of Evil script facsimile I received when I bought the HHoH Blu-ray set.

Launching soon from my chums at Scunnered Ink and VHS Productions, a new comedy folk horror graphic novel written by Greg Hemphill and Donald McLeary and illustrated by Katy Stone. www.kickstarter.com/projects/vhs...

75 years ago today those silly twisted boys, Bentine, Milligan, Secombe and Sellers launched The Goon Show on an unsuspecting world! Ying-tong-iddle-i-po and custard all round, but please, I beg of you, no more curried eggs for me!

Looking for a macabre mystery? Sherlock Holmes: The Devil's Crown may be the solution you seek. #SherlockHolmes www.amazon.co.uk/Sherlock-Hol...

Lost Late Night Horror Found Film is Fabulous! has collaborated with Darren Payne of ‘Dirt in the Gate Movies’ to preserve a missing episode of BBC television: Late Night Horror: No Such Thing As A Vampire (Broadcast: 19th April 1968)

It's thirty years since Jon Pertwee died. He was the Doctor when I fell under the spell of the show, and the Doctor on stage when I saw The Ultimate Adventure. Also a certain soppy ol' scarecrow, an Amicus vampire, and an occasional Carry On-er. Bravo! www.youtube.com/watch?v=HD_a...

This rather good documentary on Sherlock Holmes features the late David Burke's return to the role of Doctor Watson a decade after The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. www.youtube.com/watch?v=eq0i...

Sad to see reports that the great David Burke has died. A fine actor with a wide body of work on stage and screen, including the Wilmer Sherlock Holmes series, Armchair Thriller, 2 Ghost Story for Christmas films, and, of course, as an impeccable Dr Watson to Jeremy Brett's Sherlock Holmes.

WAHEY! Born 100 years ago today, and gone far too soon, but still making me laugh. Cheders, Eric! www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODTA...

Stuck with this as an earworm... www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEBl...

Nice to bump into @jamescswanton.bsky.social at York Theatre Royal this afternoon. The only previous time I saw him in person he turned into a monster from outer space... And rather brilliantly too.

Off down to York today to see The Psychic, the new stage thriller by Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman. Added bonus, tonight's performance is followed by an on-stage discussion with Jeremy about the creation of the play.

Little Nell judging the fancy dress parade and Patricia Quinn, Nell, and Barry Bostwick giving the As to the Qs in the Q&A before the screening of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, complete with shadow cast, at The Festival Theatre last night.

I absolutely loved Mother Mary at the cinema tonight. Beautiful, strange, spooky, visually stunning, and unexpectedly moving, with two incredible central performances and a very strong all female cast. Felt like I was watching an incredible bit of theatre throughout.

Instant order on this one! And if you haven't read Ray Newman's previous collections, 'Municipal Gothic' and 'Intervals of Darkness', you're missing out on some exceptional and original modern ghost stories.

we all know I have no life, so:

After an enforced break, my chronological viewing of Dark Shadows (as opposed to the jumbled back and forth of my earliest viewings) has resumed. I'm on disc 96 of 131 in the Barnabas Collins coffin boxset. I might just reach the final episode (of 1,225) by the show's 60th anniversary in June.

Revisiting Marvel's 'The Tomb of Dracula' has me wishing that the MCU would adapt these, set in the '70s, featuring the core cast of characters and the twists and turns of the almost soap opera styled plots of intrigue and betrayal as the Lord of the Vampires attempts to establish his kingdom.

'Don't Look Meow'

I just backed The Haunted Archive - A Ghost Story Manuscript of M.R. James on @kickstarter.com www.kickstarter.com/projects/cru...

Channel Premiere! Starts Monday 27th April at 6:30pm. THE VEIL (1958) Hosted by and starring #BorisKarloff This originally un-broadcast anthology series comes to #TalkingPicturesTV featuring #RobertHardy #WhitBissell #NiallMacGinnis #TorinThatcher and many more #TPTVsubtitles

Today's CD arrivals. The Dark Shadows soundtrack album 60th anniversary reissue, featuring 9 bonus tracks not available on previous releases, and the double CD of composer Robert Cobert's music for the 1991 Dark Shadows revival series.

Loved Ray Newman's previous collections of contemporary eeriness and the urban uncanny. Looking forward to being disquieted by a third volume.

Apt viewing to mark Jane Asher's 80th birthday and Roger Corman's centenary, the extraordinary 'The Masque of the Red Death'.

Born 100 years ago today, Roger Corman, director, producer, occasional actor, the man who united Price and Poe, and who mentored and encouraged a generation of film makers that followed.

Preview pages from The Haunted Archive: M.R. James's 'Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad' Facsimile manuscript with annotations and commentary by leading Jamesian experts. Kickstarter launching soon: https://bit.ly/OhWhistle   Subscribe for updates at https://www.crumpledlinenpress.com

Born 100 years ago today: Robert Holmes, prolific screenwriter, best remembered as script editor of Doctor Who for the first three years of Tom Baker's tenure, he also wrote some of the most memorable serials during the show's original run.

55 years ago today, the last episode of supernatural soap opera Dark Shadows aired, bringing to a close 1225 instalments of vampirism, witchcraft, werewolves, man-made monsters, possessions, phantoms, demons, seances, exorcisms, time travel, and parallel universes. www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKq9...

My latest Substack newsletter is live. andrewnette.substack.com/p/ghost-mess...

Been meaning to revisit the film of Brimstone & Treacle for a while, having become an admirer of Richard Loncraine's direction. The fact that this release also includes the original BBC Play for Today episode as a bonus feature seals the deal. screenbounddirect.co.uk/product/brim...