M4 Death Trip

It's another episode with a genesis almost as troubled as our Quatermass Conclusion Conclusion. This time, Jon was unable to make our discussion with Gothic expert Brontë Schiltz last November at very short notice, so Howard went it alone for the first time. But then, a bunch of uncontrollable life circumstances leading to a massive upheaval meant that the recording languished in the walls of Howard's laptop for three months. We hope that you feel it's worth the wait, as we discuss the TV studio with horror in its walls, 70s pop pseudoscience and The Tiger Who Came to Tea, along with a whole lot else. Find Brontë's links here.

It had to happen. It's time for us to deal with the One Nigel Kneale Thing We Don't Like: Kinvig. Joining us is comedy writer and performer Gemma Arrowsmith, whose new show Gemma Arrowsmith's Sketched Out has just dropped on BBC Radio 4, and we talk about why the live studio audience is going to find it funnier than we do at home, the wild transformation of situation comedy in the 1980s, and whether sci-fi nerds really have that much of a crossover with UFO fans.

In this episode, we have the Woman in Black herself, Pauline Moran, who although unwell at the time, graciously agreed to talk to us about her career in rock music, Mike Leigh, clingfilm, auditioning for a role with no lines, and the shocking failure of the media industry to supply decent roles for older women in acting.   Oh, and yeah, did you know there was an Australian adaptation of The Quatermass Experiment? No? Neither did we. A word about that in the preamble.

This month sees the publication of Tomato Cain and Other Stories, Nigel Kneale's award winning short story collection, first published in 1949. Joining Jon in this episode is Kneale biographer Andy Murray, who's been the driving force in getting this book back in print for the first time since the early 1960s. Andy talks about how the opportunity arose, why you'll find more than just the stories from the original edition here, and what you can expect from this eclectic collection (spoiler free of course), that sees the formative Kneale shaping the ideas and styles that would make him one of the more important screenwriters of the 20th century. You can order Tomato Cain and Other Stories from Comma Press here.

In this episode of BERGCAST, we're joined by Dick Fiddy, Vic Pratt and Douglas Weir of the British Film Institute to talk about restoring and re-packaging Kneale's work for the centenary year, why archive TV matters, what's happening at the BFI this month and the upcoming release of the restored version of the BBC adaptation of Nineteen Eighty-Four.  Nineteen Eighty-Four will be released on 11th April. Pre-order it here.  If you're lucky enough to be able to get to London, you can book tickets for the Nigel Kneale season at the BFI this month here. And you can find out about the April 23rd Centenary day at Picturehouse Crouch End here.

It's what they call in media a Very Special Episode, because the BERGCAST team is celebrating the 2022 centenary of Nigel Kneale's birth. We're joined by friends of BERGCAST Andy Murray, Toby Hadoke (and also Toby's dog Bernard) to talk about only some of the things that have happened and will happen very soon to mark that. The Nigel Kneale Centenary Celebration will be held at the Crouch End Picturehouse on April 23rd. You can find out a full rundown of what's going on at nigelknealecentenary.com or cut out the middlehuman and just buy your ticket here – but be quick, they're selling steadily. Toby's 7th Dimension special will air on Radio 4 Extra in the week running up to that – why not bookmark the schedules so you don't miss it? And you can pre-order your copy of Tomato Cain and Other Stories at the Comma Press site right now. Oh, and let's not forget that we'll be posting frequent updates on our Twitter feed – follow us on @BERGCASTCalling.

For our bumper sized Christmas episode, what better subject than a ghost story? Taking a deep dive into the terrifying Kneale-scripted Christmas drama The Woman in Black we're joined by Robert Taylor, author of the forthcoming book Sound Haunting: The Making of Central Films' The Woman in Black. In a lengthy and intimate discussion, we talk about the genesis of the drama, what happened when Nigel Kneale wrote the script too quickly, how a woman in a dress and a hat standing absolutely still can chill you to the bone, and the enduring power of Christmas TV memories. Robert recently wrote an essay about The Woman in Black on Horrified.com, which you can read here. It only remains for us to wish you all a merry, and ghostly Christmas. We've got big news coming in the New Year, so stay tuned. Contact will remain established.

In this episode of BERGCAST we take to the high seas as, rather than performing our usual deep dive, we stay afloat in the Kneale-scripted 1962 broadsides-and-sails spectacular HMS Defiant. Joined by film academics Prof. Melanie Williams and Dr. Mark Fryers, we investigate whether a ship is the best metaphor for the British class system, how Dirk Bogarde went from being known for light comedies to being a go to for faintly pervy villains, why the British don't do revolutions and ask the question: is the real villain always in middle management?  You can find Sixties Cinema Reconsidered here, Celluloid Tales: Norfolk Film History here, and Invictawood: The Story of Kent and the Silver Screen here.

In this special mini-episode of BERGCAST, Jon and I talk some more with legendary comics illustrator and horror expert Stephen R Bissette, about the 1966 Hammer film The Witches and its legacy and we go into what Steve's doing these days. Stephen's book on The Brood can be found here: https://www.pspublishing.co.uk/the-brood-hardcover-by-stephen-r-bissette-4784-p.asp Studio of Screams: https://www.pspublishing.co.uk/studio-of-screams-ebook-s-r-bissette-m-morris-c-golden-t-lebbon-s-volk-5280-p.asp SR Bissette's Thoughtful Creatures: https://www.amazon.co.uk/S-Bissettes-Thoughtful-Creatures-Color/dp/B09CRXYQP7

Talking with us about 1964's First Men in the Moon, we're honoured to have as our guest horror legend Stephen R. Bissette, who although perhaps best known one as of the primary collaborators with Alan Moore on the seminal 80s run of Swamp Thing, has produced a significant corpus of writing on the horror genre in all media over the space of several decades, including, most recently, an exhaustive study of David Cronenberg's early highlight The Brood. We discuss the one time Nigel Kneale shared a credit with Ray Harryhausen, why these films have resonated with us since childhood, how stop motion animation takes us right into the uncanny valley, and whether First Men in the Moon is really the first fully realised alien culture in cinema.  And by the way, you can find Jon's other podcast, Due Signori in Giallo, at duesignori.cast.rocks.

In this episode, the voices of Jon and Howard are joined by the mellifluous and delightful tones of Egyptologist and Horrified editor-at-large John J. Johnston. Join us as we explore the early career of Peter Cushing, the history of imperialism and the 50s craze for Yeti movies, Nazi practical jokes and the transcendent, formative power of the media we loved as children.

This time we're delighted to be joined by legendary screenwriter Stephen Volk, known for a list of great TV and film scripts including The Awakening, Midwinter of the Spirit, Afterlife and, of course, Ghostwatch. in a wide-ranging discussion of Stephen's career, we talk about the legacy of Nigel Kneale, how The Stone Tape changed Stephen's life, and how Stephen's own work has itself changed lives.

For this episode of BERGCAST, we were joined by veteran novelist and screenwriter Stephen Gallagher, who chatted with us about the trajectory of his career, and the influence of Nigel Kneale on his work. In a wide-ranging conversation, we talked about how a false memory of Quatermass and the Pit haunted Stephen for years, how Hollywood treats writer-creators, what Emma Peel and Bernard Quatermass would look like as a team, and whether more screenplays should be written using the Marvel Method.

On October 31st, Jon and Howard were able to do one off recording of an episode with a live audience, as part of the RURAL GOTHIC Samhain Surprise live online event. We were honoured to be joined by actor, critic and writer Jonathan Rigby, to talk, appropriately enough, about the Kneale-scripted 1966 Hammer movie The Witches.

Once again we're joined by James Cooray Smith, journalist, expert and lovely bloke, for the final part of our discussion of the final televised Quatermass story, which makes this the Quatermass Conclusion Conclusion. As we talk about the bleakest and most apocalyptic story of a pretty bleak canon, we also explore the links the 1979 ITV Quatermass has with Blood on Satan's Claw, compare Nigel Kneale with George Lucas and Charles Dickens, and what “aging well” really means.

In the first episode of a festive flurry, we're joined by journalist and expert cultural critic James Cooray Smith to discuss the troubled genesis of the final televised Quatermass story, broadcast on ITV as simply Quatermass, and given a very limited cinema release as the The Quatermass Conclusion.

We were very excited to welcome the simply amazing Samira Ahmed to talk about the somewhat overlooked contribution Nigel Kneale to the early Woodfall films. On the way we’ll examine influence of Judith Kerr or Kneale’s work, what sets Kneale apart from writers like John Wyndham, and if Donald Pleasance has ever looked young.  Hope you enjoy.

Once again, the people at BERGCAST are  delighted to welcome Andrew Screen, writer of a forthcoming guide to Beasts, Nigel Kneale's terrifying 1976 anthology series.  What was Our Nigel’s beef with the Hammer Family? How did a toy poodle play a part in one of the most chilling scenes ever shown on broadcast telly? Was there really a time when Bernard Horsfall strangled two beloved TV scientists in a single week? Which Hellraiser movie was the one with the spaceship? Tap the play button to find out.  We'd like to say a big thank you to Caroline Champion, Johnny Mains and Andy Murray for their help on this one. 

For this episode, we're joined by Andrew Screen, writer of a forthcoming book about Nigel Kneale's anthology series Beasts to talk about that, and its predecessor, Murrain, which is for obvious reasons very close to Howard's heart. Join us for a discussion of how great a terse character description can be, the truth about the farmer's name in Murrain, and what Pauline Quirke has to do with a talking Mongoose called Gef.  Andrew was also kind enough to send us pictures (taken by Julian Jones) of the locations from Murrain as they are now, a couple of which you can see here.

It's another very special episode of BERGCAST, as we're joined by our second-favourite Doctor in media, the tremendous Dr Una McCormack, with whom we're talking about the 1972 Kneale play The Stone Tape. In a discussion where we talk about the history of British manufacturing, the surprising role of Boromir, the value of fanfiction and parallels with classic Japanese horror, Una raises the very pertinent point of whether the story of a man's downfall really needs to be presented over the corpse of a woman, and we speculate as to what The Stone Tape would look like if it were feminist... and in space.

Mark Gatiss referred to Nigel Kneale as “the man who invented popular television”.  It can be a curse of a writer tagged as ‘genre’ that they may never been seen alongside the very best. As Mark said when Kneale died, “He is amongst the greats – he is absolutely as important as Dennis Potter, as David Mercer, as Alan Bleasdale, as Alan Bennett, but I think because of a strange snobbery about fantasy or sci-fi, it’s never been quite that way.” In this episode, we chat with Mark about his love for Nigel Kneale’s work, his influence and his legacy. Mark recalls the one time he met the man himself and how he tried to get greater industry recognition for Kneale. He also talks about following in the Nigel’s footsteps by adapting Wells’s The First Men in the Moon, and the experience of making The Quatermass Experiment in 2005.

In the concluding part of our look at the lost work of Nigel Kneale, Toby Hadoke talks about the practicalities of adapting The Road for radio, and Andy Murray examines the controversy of The Big, Big Giggle and its legacy in other Kneale works.  We also look at why his two Wednesday Plays are less well remembered than other missing work like Out of the Unknown: The Chopper & wonder, did Nigel invent joyriding?

In our latest lockdown special we welcome back Toby Hadoke and Andy Murray for the first of a two part look at some of Nigel Kneale's lost stories.   In this episode we examine Kneale's early radio plays, The Long Stairs and You Must Listen, Kneale's application to work at the BBC as well as classics like The Creature and The Road, which Toby adapted for radio in 2018.

There's a risk inherent in a love for obsolete technology. It can haunt us, especially if it once belonged to someone evil.  Enjoy the second of our lockdown ghost stories, written and read by Howard and introduced by Jon in his guise as BERGCAST's own Man in Black.

In Episode 12, Jon discusses Nigle Kneale's dystopian classic The Year of the Sex Olympics with writers, film historians and curators Vic Pratt and William Fowler, writers of The Bodies Beneath and leading lights of the BFI Flipside series.

BERGCAST Season Two will begin soon enough, but until then, we're going to supply you with some dead air, as the Man in Black introduces the first of a series of ghost stories, written for your pleasure and discomfort. The first of our tales, “The Austringer (1969)”, tells the story of a man who finds the Holy Grail of archive television, and the consequences of its discovery.

It's a force more powerful than 1,000 H-bombs unleashed to devastate earth! What is? Our excitement at, for the final episode of BERGCAST Season One, not only the both of us being in the same place, but getting to meet Hammer archivist and Doctor Who Magazine editor Marcus Hearn in the headquarters of the BFI no less. Marcus enlightened us on why it took so long to make a third Quatermass (but why they kept trying), and who else could have played our pal Bernard. We touch on the awkward relationship that Quatermass has with the sex/colour/blood aesthetic of Hammer Horror and Babs Windsor's bra. We hear a tale of two Roy Bakers, and muse on whether the only things violated in this movie are trade descriptions. And we talk about the power of this film, and how the juxtaposition of the prosaic and the uncanny lend it its curious power. We're taking a break for a month or so now, as we get our Martians in a line for BERGCAST Season Two, where we'll be meeting a whole new set of guests, and going to the Quatermass Conclusion... and beyond. Thanks to our lovely engineer Emma, Andrea Kinnear, Toby Hadoke and Sarah Reuben of the BFI, and also  Kier-La Janisse of the Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies, without any of whom, as the saying goes, this would not have happened.

This is the second part of our descent into the Pit with prolific writer Maura McHugh. Along with our discussion of what may be Nigel Kneale's finest moment, we look at MONSTERS FROM THE ID, the Nazi rocket scientist no one wanted, great character surnames, the entire absence of a philosophical leviathan, and HP Lovecraft's debt to bad archaeology.

Today, the BERGCAST team takes a deep dive into the only place to go: the pit, source of terror, haunting and the awful Darwinian impulse that drives the human race to suicidal mass action, which isn't remotely topical. We're joined by our special guest, novelist, playwright and Squaxx dek Thargo, the brilliant Maura McHugh. The sky. The sky is purple.

This episode sees the conclusion of Jon and guest James Goss's look at Hammer's Quatermass 2. In a wide-ranging discussion that encompasses everything from Alan Plater to Flesh Gordon, they witnesses the trauma of Sid James being shot in the face (apparently), admire the inventive use of filler text and investigate if this really is the first use of the suffix '2' in a film title. James also tells us about interviewing Nigel Kneale for his student magazine...

Donlevy's back! This episode sees the first of a two-part chat between Jon and producer and writer James Goss as we look at how he first discovered Quatermass and a slightly wider discussion on Nigel Kneale's influence on Doctor Who (including an interesting conspiracy theory concerning The Invisible Enemy), before we make the two-hour trip from London to Carlisle, via Hemel Hempstead, to begin our look at Hammer's Quatermass 2 and wonder what Donlevy's Quatermass must be like at the Rocket Group's Christmas Party. On the way we'll look at how conspiracies must seem efficient, and the terror of charm and the fear of Communist colonisation. Oh, and what actually is Broadhead's first name anyway? Jon also gives a shameless plug to the BFI's Projecting the Archive strand, and in case you were wondering, the name of the actor James was so impressed with is John Van Eyssen, probably best know for playing Jonathan Harker in Hammer's first Dracula film, in 1958.

In this episode, Jon and Howard are joined by writer and actor Gareth Preston as they examine Hammer's attempt to do Quatermass without Nigel Kneale, in Jimmy Sangster's attempt at his very own Royston and the Pit... On the way we look at how the portrayal of radiation in films might depend on which side of the atomic bomb you were at the end of World War II. We examine whether Royston just spends the entire film trying to kill his boss's son, and we witness what might be the birth of Fraser Hines's ego. All that plus the horrific deaths of the writer of the theme song to Goldfinger and the producer of Month Python.

For the second part of our look at Quatermass II, we are once again with Andy Murray, writer of Into the Unknown: The Fantastic Life of Nigel Kneale, which you can purchase here.  There's some dark stuff in the later episodes of Quatermass II, so we have to warn you that BERGCAST is not for children or persons of a nervous disposition.

Distract yourself from the political crisis and sinister machinations of the U.K. Government by letting Bernard Quatermass deal with it instead. This episode we're joined by writer Andy Murray, whose book Into the Unknown: The Fantastic Life of Nigel Kneale is an absolute must read. You can get it here. In the first of a two part chat, we look at what Nigel Kneale's been up to since The Quatermass Experiment, the casting of John Robinson and how the BBC felt the need to combat the launch of commercial television and a quick side step to the proposed Quatermass prequel, set in 1930s Berlin. Howard's short story, The Austringer, can be found here.

Quatermass gets Hammered, with Brian Donlevy. This episode we're joined by Dave Thomas, writer of Hammer: Back From The Dead, to look at Quatermass's first big screen adventure. On the way we'll look at the origins of this film and what it meant for Hammer, why Brian Donlevy might actually be the villain of the piece and what connects The Quatermass Xperiment with the Marlboro Man. We'll awaken cathartic memories of Britain's scariest comic...   ...and investigate just what the bloody hell is going on with that US poster.

In this episode, Jon Dear and guest Toby Hadoke talk about whether anything was recorded of episodes 3-6, the reason why the finale didn't go right, and the precise meaning of the word "colloidal". Find out more at bergcast.room207press.com.

The first episode of BERGCAST, (Not Really) Official Podcast of the British Experimental Rocket Group. In episode 1, Jon Dear and guest Toby Hadoke explore what connects Inspector Lomax with the Loch Ness Monster, the question of whether Katie Johnson got a cat sacked and whether the cast took a bow at the end of the final episode, and much more.