‘Dark Shadows’ Cast Photo Released; See Johnny Depp as Barnabas Collins

Earlier this month, a few paparazzi photos of Johnny Depp as Barnabas Collins were leaked on the internet. Depp was shown wearing big glasses and had his face painted a ghostly white. The image made a lot of people cringe as Tim Burton and Depp were accused of ruining the classic look of Barnabas Collins. Well, the first official photo of the Dark Shadows cast has been released and Johnny Depp doesn’t look nearly as strange as he did in the leaked photos.

In fact, Burton and Depp don’t seem to deviate too much from Jonathan Fridd’s original Barnabas Collins costume. Here’s a picture of the original cast.

Burton told Entertainment Weekly:

“I remember seeing a group photograph of the cast of the original series. For me it captured the weird Dark Shadows vibe in a single image. I had a brief window of opportunity to have our cast present at the same time, the day before principle photography began. We decided to stage a similar picture instead of rehearsing, to see if we captured the Dark Shadows feeling.”

Burton did a pretty good job of capturing the “Dark Shadows feeling.” It’s definitely a step up from the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory look that the previous images suggested.

Depp and Burton are both self-professed fanatics of the original gothic soap opera. Before shooting, Depp said:

“What Jonathan Frid did with that character and that classic look he created… I find it very difficult to stray very far from that. I think it’s going to be somewhere in that arena, with maybe just a couple of different touches here and there.”

What do you think of the new look of Barnabas Collins? Does the Dark Shadows cast capture the feeling of the original gothic soap opera?