Nigel Kneale (28 April 1922 – 29 October 2006)
The B.E.R.G.CAST suggests most people born after the era live dramatic broadcasts and the heyday of Hammer Films approach writer Nigel Kneale via the gateway drug of Doctor Who. I was no exception. As I dug deeper into the making of my beloved tv series, the name came up over and over again, until I was forced to pick up an Anchor Bay DVD double-feature with Quatermass and the Pit (1967).
My mind completely blown by the perfect mix science and superstition, a binge matched only by my descent into Dennis Potterdam followed, with Tomato Cain and Other Stories (1949), the extant episodes of The Quatermass Experiment (1953), The Quatermass Xperiment (1955), Quatermass II (1955), Quatermass 2 (1957), The Abominable Snowman (1957), Quatermass and the Pit (1958–9)—which was even better than the Hammer Adaptation!—First Men in the Moon (1964), The Witches (1966), The Year of the Sex Olympics (1968), The Stone Tape (1972), Beasts (1976), The Quatermass Conclusion (1979, television, theatrical, & novelized versions), The Woman in Black (1989), and The Quatermass Experiment (2005).
My timing was excellent, with more material available than at any time in the history of home video, and though I still have a lot to seek out, the just-released Nineteen Eighty-Four (1954) will be tonight’s treat for a day of hard work.
Ordinarily, I try to verify the quotes that accompany these postings, but I’m hideously behind already, and if this wasn’t actually said, it should have been:
“All stories should have some honesty and truth in them, otherwise you’re just playing about.”
Nigel Kneale (28 April 1922 – 29 October 2006)