Although there is perhaps far more drama written for television than any other medium, it’s still unusual for the writers to be household names.  One writer who comes closest to that status is Nigel Kneale, who made his reputation in the 1950s with the Quatermass serials and his adaptation of Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, and had a fifty year career in the medium.

Born in Barrow-in-Furness in 1922 of Manx parentage, Kneale’s family soon moved back to the Isle of Man.  A sickly child, Kneale soon immersed himself in a world of fiction.  Not physically fit enough to fight in the Second World War, he studied law, and later went to RADA and worked for a time as an actor.

He began writing short stories, winning the Somerset Maugham award.  His publisher wanted him to follow up with a novel, but Kneale drifted into broadcasting, giving readings of some of his stories on the BBC Northern Home Service in Manchester.  Moving to London, he was contracted by the BBC to write for television.  Kneale had to turn his hand to anything, including children’s programmes.  His main work however was drama, which at that time – the early 1950s – was almost all adapted stage plays and novels.

One early task was writing additional dialogue for Arrow to the Heart, produced by Austrian émigré Rudolph Cartier.  Cartier had worked at the great German film studio UFA in the 1930s, but fled the country with the rise of the Nazis.  He ended up in Britain, becoming a producer in the BBC television service in 1952.

In 1953 Kneale found himself with a new and more exciting task, to fill a six-week gap in the summer schedules on Saturday evenings.  Rather than just another classic serial, Kneale came up with an original idea about a British space rocket going wrong, and the horrific consequences.

Contact is lost with the astronauts, and on the rocket’s return to Earth, two of them have vanished.  It transpires that an alien organism has infiltrated the ship, and the sole survivor, Victor Carroon, is now an amalgam of it and his colleagues.  He transforms into a monster which is finally cornered at Westminster Abbey.

Kneale was unhappy with his original title, Bring Something Back…  After settling on Bernard Quatermass as the name of the scientist hero, the production became known as The Quatermass Experiment.

Rudolph Cartier had been assigned to produce, and he and Kneale stretched resources to the limit, making the most of the facilities at Alexandra Palace, whose cameras dated back to 1936.  The BBC had no special effects department yet, so Kneale created and operated the monster himself.

One other technical novelty they hoped to use was telerecording, or filming the live shows from a TV screen, the only way of preserving a show before the advent of videotape.  Though it had been in use since 1947, results were still unreliable.  The Quatermass Experiment recordings were done with a view to a sale to Canada – but the results were deemed too poor, so recording was cancelled after the first two episodes – but they are now some of the earliest existing television dramas.

The serial was an immediate hit with the television audience, newly increased after the Coronation of the Queen a month before saw people rushing to buy sets.  People weren’t used to such scary images, and The Quatermass Experiment became compulsive viewing.

Riding high, Kneale and Cartier’s next project (after a version of Wuthering Heights) was the dystopian classic Nineteen Eighty-Four.  George Orwell’s last novel, it was written in 1948 (the title inverting the last two digits) when he was already suffering from the tuberculosis that killed him two years later.

The hero, Winston Smith, living under constant surveillance by Telescreen, rebels by falling in love with a woman called Julia.  Knowing they are doomed, they are caught, tortured, and brainwashed back to allegiance to the dictator Big Brother.  Winston works for the Ministry of Truth, for which Orwell was inspired by his wartime work for the BBC, then overseen by the Ministry of Information.

The BBC at first planned an adaptation on the Third Programme, before deciding to present Nineteen Eighty-Four on television.  Cartier rejected an existing script by Hugh Falkus, and Kneale came up with a workable adaptation – in fact a brilliant script, matched by performances from Peter Cushing as Winston, Yvonne Mitchell as Julia, and Andre Morell as O’Brien, the representative of the oppressive state.

The live production went out on 12 December 1954 in the usual Sunday play slot, and caused a sensation.  The doom-laden tone of the piece was compounded by sequences of Winston’s torture, when he is taken to Room 101 and confronted by his greatest fear – rats.  The scene, where Winston tells his tormentor to set the rats on Julia, was easily the most harrowing thing seen on television at that time.

In fact, questions were asked in Parliament, and there was some doubt whether the scheduled Thursday repeat would go out.  In the end it did, prefaced by an introduction and warning by Head of Television Drama, Michael Barry.  This is the version that survives as a telerecording – Equity at the time would only allow a recording of the second performance of a play, to ensure actors were paid in full for both performances.

Kneale’s next work, in January 1955, was The Creature, again starring Peter Cushing.  This told of an expedition in the Himalayas that encounters the Abominable Snowman.  Later in the year, partly in response to the BBC trying to up its game with the start of ITV in September, came a sequel to The Quatermass Experiment, entitled Quatermass II, possibly the first ever sequel to use a number after the title - though in this case it refers to another rocket. 

This time the menace faced by Professor Quatermass was already on Earth, the result of meteorites which infected people with a parasitical organism.  Again, there were memorably horrific scenes, with one episode prefaced by a warning that the programme was not suitable for children or those of a nervous disposition.

In 1956 and 1957 Kneale only had two BBC credits, a remake of Arrow to the Heart, and a new play, Mrs. Wickens in the Fall.  Having become a freelance, Kneale had more connection with the film version of his second Quatermass story, having had none officially on the first film.  Kneale returned with his third Quatermass story for television at the end of 1958, and it was the best of the three in many people’s opinion.

Quatermass and the Pit gave another twist to the alien invasion theme.  Instead of the aliens newly arriving, or having been here for a year, it imagined Martians having come to Earth in ancient times and altering early humanity for their own ends.  Excavations on a bombsite unearth a space capsule, and revive psychic powers which have lain dormant in some humans.

This time Quatermass was played by Andre Morell, who had turned down the role in 1953.  The original Quatermass had been Reginald Tate, who died suddenly before Quatermass II, and was replaced by John Robinson.

Production techniques were now more sophisticated, with better cameras and plentiful pre-filming.  The effect on viewers was as powerful as the earlier outings for the Professor, perhaps more so, and it is among Kneale’s best work.  However, it was the last time he worked with Rudolph Cartier.

Kneale did less work for the BBC in the 60s, concentrating more on films, though few of his screenplays were made – a common occurrence in the movie world.  He did however contribute several notable one-off television plays.  The Road (1963) concerned an 18th Century scientific investigation of a haunted wood.  Unearthly noises turn out to emanate from a rip in time, caused by a 20th Century nuclear holocaust.

He was not involved in the 1965 remake of Nineteen Eighty-Four, part of a BBC2 George Orwell season, although it reused his script.  With the cancellation of the serial The Big, Big Giggle about a teenage suicide cult, his next BBC work was 1968’s The Year of the Sex Olympics.   

This play imagines a future where most of humanity are unthinking drones, who have their appetites sated through television.  One of the ruling caste becomes dissatisfied, and takes his wife and child to live on an island, where a psychopath is also on the loose.  The resulting events are shown on live television, in a concept that anticipates Big Brother (which of course got its title from Nineteen Eighty-Four!)  The production made full use of colour - it was Kneale's first colour television work, for the Theatre 625 strand on BBC2 - with deliberately garish sets, costumes and make-up.  An outstanding cast included Leonard Rossiter and a young Brian Cox.

Kneale wrote two editions of The Wednesday Play, in 1969 and 1970.  Bam! Pow! Zapp! was about the violent tendencies Kneale saw in young people, and how one of them faces up to the consequences.  In Wine of India, a future society guarantees a long and healthy life for citizens, until your time is finally up…

1971 saw Kneale contribute to the final series of the science fiction/fantasy anthology series Out of the Unknown.  He had declined an offer to write for it in the mid-60s, but now that ghost stories were more in vogue, he wrote The Chopper, about a haunted motorbike…

Kneale’s final major work for the BBC came on Christmas Day 1972.  The Stone Tape seemed almost an extension of the horror series Dead of Night transmitted shortly before (with the same production team).  It was set in a stately home where a team of electronics experts are looking into new recording media.  They discover the building is haunted – which leads to the hypothesis that ghosts are a kind of recording - which they investigate, with horrifying consequences...

After one last anthology piece for a series called Bedtime Stories, Kneale concentrated on work for ITV.  He wrote the quirky horror series Beasts, and a final Quatermass serial. 

Quatermass and the Pit had been made into a film in 1967, but a mooted sequel was never made.  The BBC contemplated resurrecting Quatermass to replace Doctor Who at the end of the 60s, and later commissioned Kneale for a new one-off serial, which was also cancelled.  Kneale's scripts for this were finally produced by Euston Films, the film-making offshoot of Thames Television.  However, with various delays – not least ITV going on strike in the summer of 1979 – the reception was muted, despite Kneale killing off Quatermass at the end.

A later rumoured Quatermass Experiment film never got off the ground, but there was to be another outing for the Professor, on Radio 3.  The Quatermass Memoirs was broadcast in five episodes in 1996, featuring Kneale discussing his creation, and Andrew Keir playing the lead as he had in the film of Quatermass and the Pit.

Kneale was interviewed for programmes about the science fiction and fantasy genres in the 2000s, including the dedicated tribute The Kneale Tapes, and in 2005 the BBC mounted a live remake of The Quatermass Experiment, starring Jason Flemyng, with Mark Gatiss and David Tennant.

Nigel Kneale died in October 2006, aged 84.  From Quatermass to The Stone Tape, he was a television dramatist whose work may not be revered in the same way as such luminaries as Dennis Potter, but is arguably as important a figure in British culture.  His influence is felt to this day in every alien, fantasy or supernatural drama, and doubtless will be for decades to come.

Tell us your memories and thoughts on the work and influence of Nigel Kneale.  Anyone contributing in Manx will earn triple points.  See also our old blog on scary TV…

One of the most important craft skills in television is that of the designer – now usually called the production designer. 

He or she is responsible primarily for the sets of a programme (and ‘settings’ is how they are credited in many early programmes), but in a more general sense, for making the 'world' of a programme, whether fictional or factual, into something that can be realised in a studio or on location.

Television has been described - especially in its early, live, days - as a hybrid of radio, theatre and film.  Its immediacy and reach was similar to radio; it had film’s property of presenting a story in pictures with the ability to cut from one image to another.   It mirrored theatre in that only certain effects could be achieved physically because of  limited space, and because the action had to be mounted continuously in real time, even if it was discontinuous in the play.

Increasingly sophisticated visual effects  such as CGI and green-screen, have become a common element in many modern productions, enabling scenes that need impossibly large casts, sets, or fantastic landscapes to be realised.  Though technicians are a vital part of creating such effects, they would not be effective without the skills of designers.  Lighting and camerawork of course play a vital central role in realising the visuals of a programme, and cannot be ignored as part of the design equation – but that is a topic for another time...

The origins of television design

The very earliest television, low-definition broadcasts by the Baird company from 1929, had very limited design elements because of the nature of the technology.  30-line images were so poor that the constant problem was to create any kind of meaningful image, so anything other than a plain backcloth would probably have been more of a hindrance.  Early television did however use a chequerboard pattern flooring which gave a basic sense of perspective.  

A new world was opened up by high definition television in 1936.  At first artists often performed in front of curtains, behind which successive acts could be in waiting, but soon the desire for more complex scenery arose, particularly for drama.  Early scenery was crude, partly because even with a higher line standard, pictures were not very sharp, and still in black and white, they were seen at home on tiny screens.  But there were was an increasing sophistication of design, with pioneers like Peter Bax responding to the rapid rise in the ambition and complexity of productions. 

Plays like the modern dress Julius Caesar, R.U.R., gangster drama Smoky Cell, or The Fame of Grace Darling, showed the range of productions attempted.  There were also shorter productions like the romantic comedy Ann and Harold and the series of ‘whodunnits’ called Telecrimes, the design for which made the most of limited resources.  One of the more adventurous techniques was the ‘penumbrascope’, which used impressionistic shadows to create moods quickly and economically.

With the seven year hiatus caused by World War Two, television hardly developed until the 1950s, but there was a new influx of talent after the war, and increasingly sophisticated technology.  Better cameras, the spread of television beyond London, and the beginnings of recording technology all added to the excitement around the medium.  Design started to become more important, whether Hollywood-influenced variety settings, or increasingly realistic backdrops for dramas.  With more programmes, designers had to be found from a range of disciplines, rather than just theatre design or cinema art direction.

The Quatermass Experience

The existing early recordings of programmes give us a chance to see how settings worked within programmes, rather than relying on still photographs for evidence as we have to do with earlier broadcasts. 

One of the earliest existing shows is The Quatermass Experiment (designer Stewart Marshall), Nigel Kneale’s ground-breaking science fiction horror story from 1953. From the two surviving episodes it can be seen that ambitious sets like the wreckage of a house destroyed by a crashing rocket were possible.  Later episodes featured the story’s climax in Westminster Abbey, which used a mixture of studio sets and photo blow-ups.

The following year Kneale adapted George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four (Barry Learoyd) in a memorable and historic version, which had highly effective design elements – from scene-setting paintings of ruined London, to the contrasting technological sheen of the Ministry of Truth and the shabby houses of the ‘proles’. 

The Quatermass series are a useful way of studying the developments of television through the 50s, with series made in 1953, 1955 and 1958 demonstrating changes in acting style, production and design.  The 1955 series Quatermass II (Stephen Taylor) already has a faster pace, and more ambitious sets, making the most of the space available at Lime Grove studios. 

While some of its more memorable sequences are achieved using the increased amount of filming available, the studio sets show how effectively a story can be told by creating a series of different places that set contrasting scenes – from an Army radar truck, to laboratories and control rooms, cafes to committee rooms in the Houses of Parliament.

The final BBC Quatermass series, Quatermass and the Pit (Clifford Hatts), showed how programmes could be opened out even more.  By this time the BBC’s own film studios at Ealing were fully functioning, and the main location, the ‘Pit’, an excavation site in London’s Knightsbridge containing a crashed Martian spaceship, was effectively realised both at Ealing and in the BBC’s Riverside Studios. 

Television Centre meanwhile, as a purpose built programme factory, did make life easier for designers in realising their visions.  With dedicated workshops for constructing and painting scenery, linked to the studios by access roads, many of the problems associated with other venues were overcome.  There is a story that the original police box prop built for Doctor Who in 1963 had to be reduced in size because it could not be fitted into the scenery lift at Lime Grove, an idiosyncratic building at best.

Outside the sphere of drama and comedy, sets are still important to create the mood and house the action of shows from variety to politics and current affairs, chat shows to children’s factual programmes.

A Whole Scene Going

In these cases the design edict that form follows function is king:  Blue Peter needed a large, empty studio to accommodate gymnastic displays, large vehicles, pop bands, and at Christmas, hordes of schoolchildren and the Chalk Farm Salvation Army band – but the presenters were usually to be found firstly on the iconic seating unit in the centre of the studio, the focal point of each episode. 

In discussion shows, the designer needs to consider where to position the chairperson and the guests, and sometimes there is an audience too, as with Question Time.  Likewise the modern proliferation of panel shows such as Have I Got News for You has seen their set designs become more inventive as while retaining a common layout of panellists and compere.  Chat shows tend to have a more relaxed version of the same layout.

Another vital aspect of design is the technical one of where the camera and sound crews can be placed so they can actually record the programme.  With audience shows, whether chat shows or sitcoms, the audience should be able to see the action going on, though inevitably some sequences will only be visible on studio monitors.

Oh in Colour

When colour made its entrance in the late 1960s, there needed to be a rethink on the part of all designers.  Although it had been in development since the 50s, the technology turned out to be over-sensitive to certain shades, and it took much trial and error before realistic-looking  colours were achieved.  The start of BBC2 in 1964 had also meant recruiting extra design staff, and new ideas were imported along with them, which saw fruition in the brave new world of colour.

As years have gone on, other technological challenges have faced designers – from better cameras, subtler lighting, to widescreen and high definition, with the latter potentially only increasing in sharpness.  The decline of film and its replacement with ‘filmised’ videotape production has no doubt also had subtle effects on design effort, although the ease with which videotaped images can be replayed makes life easier for the designer as well as the director in allowing them to quickly see how their work looks, and how it could be improved.

As long as television is made there will be a place for the designer.  While many programmes can be made now in ‘real’ locations, there is still a certain amount of artifice needed for the particular needs of productions.

Much of television is still made in studio conditions, and it’s a rare programme that needs no setting at all, or just the minimal curtain that sufficed back in the early 1930s.  Every show has its unique challenges, and in the final analysis it is the experience and skill of the designer that has to solve them.

What are your favourite iconic settings for programmes?  Share your thoughts on the importance of television design in the box below...