by Kate Beach, Staff Writer

“Certain it is, the place still continues under the sway of some witching power, that holds a spell over the minds of the good people, causing them to walk in a continual reverie. They are given to all kinds of marvelous beliefs, are subject to trances and visions, and frequently see strange sights, and hear music and voices in the air.”

The air is crisp, the leaves are crunchy, and it’s time for a good old fashioned public domain adaptation. Washington Irving’s 1820 short story The Legend of Sleepy Hollow has been a fall favorite for generations and, since the dawn of film and television, it’s been adapted over and over again. While today’s most recognizable iteration of the story is probably Tim Burton’s 1999 film, Ichabod Crane has been no stranger to the small screen. Grab a sweater and join me on a brisk autumn walk through a few televisual versions of the enduring Halloween tale. Watch your head!

THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW (1980)

Did you know that Jeff Goldblum once played Ichabod Crane? Now that you do, doesn’t it kind of make sense? The famously gangly, rubber-limbed Crane feels like a good physical match to Goldblum’s whole vibe. Irving describes Crane as “tall, but exceedingly lank, with narrow shoulders, long arms and legs, hands that dangled a mile out of his sleeves, feet that might have served for shovels, and his whole frame most loosely hung together.” Sounds Goldblumian to me.

This made-for-TV movie aired on Halloween night of 1980 on NBC. It was shot in Park City, Utah, which… looks absolutely nothing like New York’s Hudson Valley. For a story that sets the scene so beautifully, casting Sleepy Hollow as a mystical, bewitching place, it doesn’t show at all here. What should be a colorful fall landscape is just piles of snow. Former football star Dick Butkus co-stars as town bully Brom Bones, reading every line like he’s in an infomercial. Everyone is costumed like they’re giving a guided tour of Colonial Williamsburg. One thing this telling gets right is the superstitious nature of the residents of Sleepy Hollow, with children and adults alike mentioning eerie apparitions beyond the Horseman. It more or less keeps to the plot of Irving’s story, but with the casting of Goldblum, it does make Ichabod Crane way too cool. Available on YouTube.

SHELLEY DUVALL’S TALL TALES AND LEGENDS (1985)

Hello! She’s Shelley Duvall! While it’s not as celebrated as the late, great Duvall’s iconic Fairie Tale Theater, her Tall Tales and Legends anthology series was just as fun and packed with celebrities. This iteration features Ed Begley, Jr. as our Ichabod, with Beverly D’Angelo as Katrina Van Tassel. Charles Durning serves as both the narrator and Doffue Van Tassel, Katrina’s uncle and a character invented for the show. Tim Thomerson rounds out the cast as Brom Bones, playing him with a sneering Gaston vibe.

This is the only adaptation in this bunch that truly leans into Ichabod Crane’s neuroses and superstitiousness. Begley’s Crane is constantly clutching a talisman or hanging garlic, eyes darting around anticipating imminent danger. Crucially, he’s depicted as popular with the woman of Sleepy Hollow, who see him as a charming, urbane weirdo entirely different from the other men in town. D’Angelo is a hilarious, campy Katrina, wide-eyed and flirtatious. It’s fun, funny, and one of the most faithful adaptations of the story to be found on television. Available on YouTube.  

ARE YOU AFRAID OF THE DARK? (1994)

If you were a Nickelodeon kid in the 90s, like me, Are You Afraid of the Dark? was gateway horror at its finest. Genuinely creepy while still gentle enough for kids, it specialized in ghosts, monsters, and the gentlest of jump scares. Its framing device, a group of kids gathering to share stories around a fire, always made me want to start a Midnight Society of my own. While this Canadian series often came up with original stories, they occasionally adapted a classic. As its popularity grew, it became a great place for current and future stars to dabble in a little horror. Watch long enough and you’ll see Ryan Gosling (co-starring with Gilbert Gottfried!), a pre-Scream Neve Campbell, and more. 

Called “The Tale of the Midnight Ride,” the story is told by prospective Midnight Society member (and classic TV little brother) Tucker. It takes a Hocus Pocus-style approach, placing the legend in the context of a new kid moving into present day Sleepy Hollow. It transfers some Crane-like tendencies onto that new kid, Ian, a charming nerd who draws the school bully’s ire by flirting with the girl he likes. It’s a riff on the story more than a straight adaptation, and real denizens of Sleepy Hollow probably don’t have such strong Canadian accents (sore-y!) but it’s a fun, lightly spooky introduction to the legend. Available on YouTube.

SLEEPY HOLLOW (2013 - 2017)

The last stop on our tour through the public domain is the most recent, the most ambitious, and the biggest departure from Irving’s original story. Sleepy Hollow premiered in September 2013, at a time when the traditional networks were willing to take chances on high concept genre shows, likely inspired by cable hits like The Walking Dead and American Horror Story. During Sleepy Hollow’s four season run, a number of other horror series came and went, including 666 Park Avenue on ABC, The Exorcist on Fox, and Grimm on NBC.   

To get into Sleepy Hollow, it’s best to forget most of what you might know about the short story. It’s not super relevant! Tom Mison played a British Ichabod Crane, a former Oxford professor who came to the side of Washington and the Colonists, became a spy, and married Katrina Van Tassel. Rather than hearing the story of the Hessian years later, this Ichabod Crane is the man responsible for separating the horseman from his head. Crane is also killed in their battle, only to rise from the dead in modern day Sleepy Hollow. He teams up with Lieutenant Abbie Mills (Nicole Beharie) to figure out what happened to him, who the horseman really is, and how to stop him. The first two seasons featured greats like Clancy Brown, Orlando Jones, John Noble, and underrated scream king John Cho, all of whom get respectable arcs and plenty to do. It settles into a monster of the week serial while Crane and Mills also fight season-long enemies like demons, the four horsemen of the apocalypse (get it?), and warlocks. 

This show had everything: golems, Masons, Benjamin Franklin Frankenstein’ing dead soldiers to make a superpowered monster (Beharie calls it Franklinstein’s. Monster, it’s very funny.) It’s delightful to watch Mison rail against everything from fast food to credit card debt. Beharie is a fantastic heroine, steely and bold but brimming with emotion and vulnerability. Their chemistry together was off the charts. The show’s strength was its silliness, its willingness to throw a bunch of weird stuff at the wall and make it stick through the charm offensive of Beharie and Mison.

And then after two seasons, it all started to fall apart. Showrunner Mark Goffman departed ahead of season three, and Noble, Cho, and Jones all left as well (Noble later returned as a recurring character in the final season.) And then, in 2016, Beharie left the show and her character was given a sendoff that shocked and disappointed fans. In 2020, Beharie spoke out about her departure, citing a lack of concern for her health and wellbeing, and unequal treatment between her and her co-star, Mison. It was infuriating and unsurprising. Sleepy Hollow limped to the barn in 2017 with a shortened season set in Washington, DC, having squandered the goodwill it built in its first two seasons. Available on Hulu.

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow endures because it’s a perfect piece of autumnal Americana. Irving paints a picture of the quaint, tucked away farming community with its superstitious villagers and local hauntings. It’s been around long enough and retold often enough that Ichabod Crane and the Headless Horseman are nearly instantly recognizable characters, no matter who’s telling their story. This Halloween, get cozy and give a few of them a try. Just quit Sleepy Hollow after season two.