The Dark Shadows Daybook: April 11

By PATRICK McCRAY

Taped on this date in1968: Episode 473

Roger’s luggage is in the foyer, but he is missing… and Angelique’s painting has returned.  Barnabas is equally mystified, but the return of the picture suggests that Roger is somewhere nearby.  Privately, Barnabas asks Vicki to destroy the portrait.  Roger’s change began when she brought the portrait into the house.  It’s a force that controls him.  Barnabas reveals that he and Julia saw Roger at Dr. Lang’s the previous night, and that he leapt from Julia’s car when she tried to drive him home. Roger enters ebulliently, introducing his new bride — Cassandra, clearly Angelique in a black wig. Roger insists on a honeymoon in Martinique, and suggests that they’ll be leaving immediately.  Cassandra is fascinated with Barnabas, especially the fact that he never married.  Barnabas finds it too incredible to believe. In the library, Liz demands an explanation from Roger.  Liz threatens to reveal the fact that Roger is technically married to Laura, still.  Then she finds out that Roger and Cassandra barely know one another, but he’s uncontrollably smitten.  Liz insists that Roger commit himself, but he forbids it, threatening to leave Collinwood, never to return.  Alone with Vicki, Cassandra confesses that she was Professor Stokes’ student, and that’s how she met Roger.  She sends Vicki to bring David to her and to hurry Roger along.  Finally alone with her painting, Angelique admires the change in her hair, laughing characteristically.

Lara Parker comes back to the series to the delight of viewers after an absence since episode 411, and she immediately steals the show. In a show of perfect moments, this may be the single episode where it establishes itself as one solely intended to throw out rules, probability, and anything else standing in the way of an audience having a grand time. Speaking of a grand time, the Civil Rights Act of 1968 was also signed on this day.