100 Greatest British Television Programmes, "Nigel Kneale, creator of cult TV figure Quatermass, dies aged 84", "Kneale, Nigel (1922–2006)—Film & TV credits", "BBC FOUR to produce a live broadcast of the sci-fi classic, The Quatermass Experiment", "Doctor Who Classic Episode Guide – The Daemons", Article by Mark Holcomb from The Believer, March/April 2010, The Quatermass Trilogy – A Controlled Paranoia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nigel_Kneale&oldid=988171449, Alumni of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, People educated at St Ninian's High School, Douglas, Wikipedia articles with BIBSYS identifiers, Wikipedia articles with SNAC-ID identifiers, Wikipedia articles with SUDOC identifiers, Wikipedia articles with WORLDCATID identifiers, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 11 November 2020, at 15:15. [38], Kneale's next television series was a departure from his usual style—Kinvig, his sole attempt at writing a sitcom, produced by London Weekend Television and broadcast on ITV in the autumn of 1981. Much in the vein of his "Beasts" TV series, its a slow burner, but the intelligent dialogue makes the viewing experience a total … [48], In 1958, Kneale's play Mrs Wickens in the Fall, transmitted by the BBC the previous year, was remade by the CBS network in the United States, retitled The Littlest Enemy. A particular critical success was The Year of the Sex Olympics, broadcast as part of BBC2's Theatre 625 series in July 1968. This is an edited version of Neil Snowdon’s interview with Joe Dante on Nigel Kneale, which is published in the newly released book We Are the Martians: The Legacy of Nigel Kneale. [98] He was also responsible for a painting of a lobster from which special effects designers Bernard Wilkie and Jack Kine drew their inspiration for the Martian creatures they constructed for the original television version of Quatermass and the Pit. The dialogue/characterisation seemed to consist of a kind of childish squabbling" and Doomwatch: "I was approached to write Doomwatch. [18] He left the corporation when his contract expired at the end of 1956;[39] "Five years in that hut was as much as any sane person could stand," he later told an interviewer. [50] Kneale was nominated for the British Film Award (later known as a BAFTA) for Best Screenplay for both films. [44] On this occasion Kneale was inspired by the racial tensions that had recently been seen in the United Kingdom, and which came to a head while the serial was in pre-production when the Notting Hill race riots occurred in August and September 1958. He started on television, where his five-part series The Quatermass Experiment in 1953 took the fledgling British television industry by storm, racking up huge audiences despite the relative rarity of TV sets at that time. [3][4] His family came from the Isle of Man, and returned to live there in 1928, when he was six years old. In 2000, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Horror Writers Association. In a January 2015, BBC Radio 2 gave an interview with Hammer Films CEO Simon Oaks with news of developing a new Quatermass series for television. [78] According to The Independent, Kneale conceived a storyline involving the young Quatermass becoming involved in German rocketry experiments in the 1930s, and helping a young Jewish woman to escape from the country during the 1936 Berlin Olympics.[7]. Live on the Night: The Story of Live TV Drama. Don't let SILENCE go silent! Professor Bernard Quatermass is a fictional scientist, originally created by the writer Nigel Kneale for BBC Television. They say a whole party of American tourists fell to their knees. For this adaptation, Nigel Kneale himself was allowed to write the first draft of the screenplay, although subsequent drafts were worked on by director Val Guest. [38] Written in 1965 while Kneale was suffering from a mystery illness and forced to stay in bed for a long period, the concept started life as a drama serial for the BBC, before the corporation had second thoughts about the nature of the storyline and the possibility of copycat suicides;[17] Kneale later agreed that they were probably right not to make it for television. [17] Kneale was unable to find backing to produce the play for the stage, but sold the script to ATV who put it into pre-production for television. [40] Kneale was disappointed that Brian Donlevy also returned in the role of Quatermass. Joe Dante is one of the great heroes of American cinema. The same year saw the formation of the ... Roy Ward Baker, 1967), easily the best film adaptation of his television work thanks to his own script and a decent budget. 1922-2006. [17] Neither of these scripts ever saw production, as the companies making them went out of business—Kneale commented in a 2003 interview that "I reckon I closed down at least two film companies. He was a writer and actor, known for, Barrow-in-Furness, Lancashire, England, UK. [6] In 1951 he was recruited as one of the first staff writers to be employed by BBC Television;[16] before he started working for the BBC, Kneale had never seen any television. He started on television, where his five-part series The Quatermass Experiment in 1953 took the fledgling British television industry by storm, racking up huge audiences despite the relative rarity of TV sets at that time. [6] He made further radio broadcasts in the 1940s, including a reading of his story Zachary Crebbin's Angel on the BBC Light Programme, broadcast nationally on 19 May 1948. His first professional script writing credit came when he wrote the radio drama The Long Stairs, broadcast by the BBC on 1 March 1950 and based on an historical mining disaster on the Isle of Man. In 2000, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Horror Writers Association. [29], Kneale and Cartier next collaborated on an adaptation of Wuthering Heights (broadcast 6 December 1953) and then on a version of George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (12 December 1954). In 1968's The Year of the Sex Olympics, Kneale, a pioneering writer of TV drama who died this week, ingeniously predicted the future of lowest-common-denominator TV. [62], In 1965 Kneale had been approached by the producer of the BBC2 science-fiction anthology series Out of the Unknown to write a new one-off 75-minute Quatermass story for the programme. [37] Kneale was not pleased with the film,[6] and particularly disliked the casting of Brian Donlevy as Quatermass, as he explained in a 1986 interview. [62], Kneale was admired by the film director John Carpenter,[3][31] who hired Kneale to write the screenplay Halloween III. [40] The film premiered at the end of May 1957,[41] and was reviewed positively in The Times: "The writer of the original story, Mr Nigel Kneale, and the director, Mr Val Guest, between them keep things moving at the right speed, without digressions. [2], Kneale was born Thomas Nigel Kneale in Barrow-in-Furness, England. [10] Kneale's first credited role in adult television drama was providing "additional dialogue" for the play Arrow to the Heart, broadcast on 20 July 1952. He was a writer and actor, known for The Entertainer (1960), Look Back in Anger (1959) and Quatermass and the Pit (1967). 1 month ago. Miller, David. Here he talks about working with the man who invented modern television. [8] Kneale worked with Kerr on an adaptation of When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit in the 1970s, but the eventual makers of the film version disregarded their script. Or in the case of Mr Donlevy, waddle."[38]. [85], High-profile entertainment industry figures have publicly expressed admiration for Kneale's work, including The Beatles' drummer Ringo Starr,[87] members of the rock group Pink Floyd[87] and Monty Python's Flying Circus writer/performer Michael Palin. The Stone Tape was written by Nigel Kneale, best known as the writer of Quatermass. [6], Kneale had returned to writing for television with the BBC for the first time since Quatermass and the Pit when his play The Road was broadcast in September 1963. No need to waste time endlessly browsing—here's the entire lineup of new movies and TV shows streaming on Netflix this month. "[62] The island locations scenes for the production were filmed on the Isle of Man, Kneale's homeland. [6] The play concerned the population of an 18th-century village who become haunted by visions of a future nuclear war,[3] and was followed by several further one-off dramas for the BBC over the following decade, including two entries into BBC1's The Wednesday Play anthology strand. [18] During this period he was regarded as one of the finest writers working for the BBC. The same year that he left the BBC, Kneale wrote his first feature film screenplay, adapting Quatermass II for Hammer Film Productions along with producer Anthony Hinds and director Val Guest. But thanks to a new Blu-ray release, its legend lives on . Nigel Kneale was born in Barrow-in-Furness, then in Lancashire, but grew up on the Isle of Man. [6] His first script for ITV in this period was the one-off play Murrain, made by the network's Midlands franchise holders Associated TeleVision (ATV) in 1975. [4] At the beginning of the Second World War Kneale attempted to enlist in the British Army, but was deemed medically unfit for service[7] owing to photophobia, from which he had suffered since childhood. [24] The serial told the story of Professor Bernard Quatermass of the British Experimental Rocket Group, and the consequences of his sending the first manned mission into space where a terrible fate befalls the crew and only one returns. [31] Film producer Harry Saltzman, who had produced the two Osborne adaptations, approached Kneale about scripting a project he was working on to adapt Ian Fleming's James Bond novels for the cinema; Kneale was not a fan of Fleming's work and turned the offer down. He took very little interest in the making of the films or in playing the part. The following year, Michael Barry became the Head of Drama at BBC Television, and spent his entire first year's script budget of £250 to hire Kneale as a full-time writer for the drama department. [19] It was the beginning of a successful working relationship between the pair, that would lead to some of Kneale's best known work. [57] Nothing came of this, but seven years later he was commissioned by the BBC to write a new four-part Quatermass serial, based in a dystopian near future world overrun with crime, apathy, martial law and youth cults. … Moved Permanently. The film premiered at the end of May 1957, and was reviewed positively in The Times: "The writer of the original story, Mr Nigel Kneale, and the director, Mr Val Guest, between them keep things moving at the right speed, without digressions. [3] A keen cinema-goer, he believed that the audience being able to see human faces was an important factor in storytelling.[15]. [81] The horror fiction writer Stephen King has cited Kneale as an influence,[3][31] and Kim Newman suggested in 2003 that King had "more or less rewritten Quatermass and the Pit in The Tommyknockers. [38] Starring John Mills as Quatermass and with a budget of over £1 million[57]—more than fifty times the budget of Quatermass and the Pit in 1958[69]—the serial was not as critically successful as its predecessors. [75] When he did submit the script three weeks later, he discovered that Central had been about to cancel the production as they had assumed that Kneale, then 67, had not been able to complete the work due to his age. Kneale's script, Jack and the Beanstalk, was transmitted on 24 March 1974, and marked the end of his BBC writing career. [27] The Professor's first name was chosen in honour of the astronomer Bernard Lovell. I just wrote screenplays. No Comments » Search. [32] The Guardian newspaper's obituary of Kneale in 2006 claimed that the adaptation had "permanently revived Orwell's reputation,"[4] while the British Film Institute included it in their list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes of the 20th century in 2000. [72], Kneale's treatment for the film met with the approval of John Carpenter, the producer of the Halloween series, although Kneale was required to write the script in only six weeks. Sutton, p. 20 and p. 54. 662 (March 1989): 90–96. At his initial job interview with Michael Barry, Cartier had criticised the department's output as being too sedate and theatrical,[20] while Kneale was frustrated at what he saw as the slow and boring styles of television drama production then employed, which he felt wasted the potential of the medium. [40] Hinds and Guest had overseen the first Quatermass film, upon which Kneale had been unable to work due to his BBC staff contract. “Christmas Eve with my mum and dad. Manx-born author/screenwriter Nigel Kneale was one of the most compelling and influential film writers to come out of England in the '50s. [49] It was Kneale's only involvement with American television, and he was not pleased with the result. “Fantasy Flashback: Quatermass &Amp; The Pit.” TV … The series introduced a new, much more mature … Cine-literate, politically aware and scathingly … He died on October 29, 2006 in London, England. [68], In the mid-1970s, Kneale made his only attempt at writing a stage play. [75], Susan Hill herself did not like some of the changes that Kneale had made to The Woman in Black. "[38] Doctor Who was heavily influenced by Kneale's Quatermass serials,[88][89][90] in some cases even using specific storylines that were very similar to those from Quatermass.[91][92]. We are going to need many more 'Quatermass Experiment' programmes. [72] Kneale agreed, on the proviso that it would be a totally new concept unrelated to the first two films, which he had not seen and he did not like what he had heard about them. A Weekend with Nigel Kneale is at Chapter Cinema, Market Road, Canton, Cardiff (01222 311050), from Thursday to Monday. [99], Nigel Kneale in 1990, discussing his career on. [38] It was also his final new collaboration with Rudolph Cartier, although the director did later handle a new version of Kneale's 1953 adaptation of Wuthering Heights for the BBC in 1962. [38], In May 1957, Kneale was contracted by the BBC to write a third Quatermass serial,[39] and this was eventually transmitted as Quatermass and the Pit across six weeks in December 1958 and January 1959. "[96], Kneale's younger brother is the renowned artist and sculptor Bryan Kneale, who was Master and then Professor of Sculpture at the Royal Academy from 1982 to 1990. 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