M4 Death Trip

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

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.