Other
Characters: Cassandra Blair Collins 1968, Return
to Collinwood, Angélique Dubois/Duval 1897,
Angélique Rumson 1970 (pictured), Alexis Stokes,
Angélique Stokes Collins 1970 Parallel Time, Miranda
Collins/Valerie Collins 1840, Miranda duVal
1692, Catherine Harridge Collins 1841 Parallel Time,
Angélique Collins Night of Dark Shadows
The maidservant of Josette DuPres, Angélique's descent into
the black arts has taken her through centuries, her passions
and hatred unabated. Resentful of her inability to transcend
the class barriers of the 18th Century, and driven by equal
love and hatred for Barnabas Collins, Angélique possesses
compassion and spite simultaneously, torn between her better
instincts, her desire for survival, and her allegiances
to the darkest forces that she finds herself in reluctant
thrall to…
Lara
Parker was born Mary
Lamar Rickey on 27 October 1942, in Knoxville, Tennessee,
spending her childhood in Memphis. Lamar is a family name,
originally belonging to her great, great grandfather L.Q.C
Lamar, who was a US senator. Attending high school in Memphis,
she gained a scholarship to Vasar College, majoring in Philosophy,
receiving a BA. Attending graduate school at the University
of Iowa, she completed a Masters degree in Speech and Drama.
In the summer she wrote her thesis, Lara acted at the Millbrook
Playhouse in Loch Haven, Pennsylvania, taking five leading
roles. Following this, she decided to take a trip to New
York, where she auditioned successfully for the role of
Angélique on Dark
Shadows. During her
time on the show, Lara appeared in the Broadway play Woman
is My Idea, and the
off-Broadway plays Lulu
and A Gun Play.
Lara moved to Los Angeles in 1972, moving into work in film
and primetime television. Her film credits include Race
With the Devil, Save the Tiger, Hi Mom!, Foxfire Light
and China Lake Murders.
Her television roles include appearances in Barnaby
Jones, The Rockford Files, Quincy, The Night Stalker, The
Six Million Dollar Man, Kojak, City of Angels, Hawaii 5-0,
The Incredible Hulk, Galactica 1980, Remington Steele, Washington:
Behind Closed Doors, A New Day in Eden, One Life to Live
and Capitol.
Today, Lara is married to building contractor Jim Hawkins,
and lives in a house she and her husband designed, which
stands in the Santa Monica mountains. She has three children,
Rick, Andy and Caitlin.
Towards the end of the 1980s, Lara began attending classes
in screenplay writing at UCLA Extension, and has completed
five screenplays to date, One
Child, Late in the Season, The French Girl, Dreammaker
and Stardust,
which remain in development. During the 1990s, she also
taught High School students and directed several productions
at her daughter's school. She has also written about Dark
Shadows in a number
of titles for Pomegranate Press.
In 1998, Lara penned her first novel, Dark
Shadows: Angélique's Descent,
which sold over 35,000 copies in paperback. She also wrote
an introduction for its 1999 sequel, Dark
Shadows: Dreams of the Dark.
She also formed her own publishing company, Old Canyon Press,
to publish a collection of her mother's children's poetry,
Critters and Bugs
I Have Known. At
present, Lara continues to concentrate on her writing career,
which includes a projection for another Dark
Shadows novel. She
maintains a personal website, located at laraparker.com.
In recent years, Lara has attended California's Antioch
University, gaining a Masters Degree in creative writing.
In 2006, she completed her second Dark Shadows
novel, The Salem Branch.
In
2003, Lara reprised Angelique in the Return to Collinwood
reunion audio play. In
2006, she again reprised the role for Big Finish's series
of Dark Shadows CD audio dramas.
Photographs
· Click on the thumbnails
to view the full-size image
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Lara
Parker in a rare pose from the play Woman is
my Idea in 1969.
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Visit
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and Features section to read an exclusive interview
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