The name Quatermass is synonymous with science fiction at its most compelling, and has been through many incarnations on television, in film, and on radio. The 'series' started when Nigel Kneale created the character of Professor Bernard Quatermass for the BBC series 'The Quatermass Experiment' in 1953. 'Quatermass II' and 'Quatermass and the Pit' followed at 2 year intervals after the success of Experiment and the legend was born.

Only parts of the first two series survive, but Quatermass and the Pit exists in its entirety and has been released both on video and DVD. This was my first contact with Quatermass, and despite the rather slow pace of the series by today's standards, it stands up as a wonderful piece of TV science fiction After the success of the TV series, the transition of Quatermass from the small screen to the cinema was inevitable, and Hammer Films Ltd were those to do it. All three of the series got the Hammer treatment, and all three have been issued on DVD by DDVideo.

The final instalment of the series was Quatermass, which has been issued in a stunning presentation box by Clearvision. Released in 1979, this was produced by Euston Films, the film arm of Thames Television. Originally Kneale had approached the BBC, but the proposed budget was to great for the BBC, and he took it to the other side. Various glitches occurred in the production, and Stonehenge, originally proposed as the main centre for the story, was unavailable, but a props team with a lot of fibreglass were able to knock together something convincing, if not on such a grand scale. There was a further change of actor for this production, and this time Sir John Mills portrayed an aging, and retired, Professor Quatermass who had retreated to Scotland while the rest of the UK degenerated into crime and violence.

Euston films, being a commercial company, always kept an eye on the budgets and it was decided that the story would be written in such a way as to be able to edit together a 4 part TV series and a shorter film for cinema release - The Quatermass Conclusion. This was not done at the expense of the story, but rather carefully planned by Kneale, and the results were quite acceptable. Clearvision, in their DVD and video sets of the series, have provided both versions of the story, along with an interview with Kneale first broadcast on the Sci-Fi channel, and a comprehensive booklet. Whilst everyone agrees that the BBC series are the definitive Quatermass, there is still a lot to be said for the Euston Films production, although it is more dated than the 50s serials.

Over the TV series and films, there were no less than 5 actors who played the Professor. For television, the character was first portrayed by Yorkshire born Reginald Tate, and Kneale regarded him as the definitive Quatermass, however, shortly before Quatermass II was due for filming, he died, and a replacement had to be found. His place was taken by John Robinson, and despite being slightly younger than Tate, he was accepted in the role. By the time of Quatermass and the Pit the BBC had invested more money on the production and one of the results was the use of a name actor - Andre Morell. As this was my first exposure to Quatermass, it is Morell who is the definitive Professor to me (I suppose in the same way that Tom Baker is my Doctor Who!).

In the Hammer films, there were two actors, the first of whom was Brian Donlevy. Kneale was rather dismayed at Hammer's choice of actor, as Donlevy was American (technically he was from Ireland, but had been working in American films for some time) and didn't play the character in the same vein as those in the BBC series. Hammer chose the bluff Scots actor Andrew Keir to play the leading role in the last film, Quatermass and the Pit, and he was much more to Kneale's taste. As he was a regular in Hammer films, and Quatermass and the Pit became a cult film in the UK and US, he is the actor identified most with the role, and as such, when BBC radio decided to produce the Quatermass Memoirs in 1996, is was Keir who was chosen for the role.

The memoirs were in five parts, each 20 minutes long, and first broadcast on Radio 3 in March 1996. It took the form of a docu-drama, mixing mixing interview, archive and adventure. Nigel Kneale reflected on how Cold War paranoia led him to devise Professor Bernard Quatermass in the 1950's. Keir returned to the role, with Emma Gregory as Mandy and Zulema Dene as Maire. The series has subsequently been broadcast a couple of times on the digital archive channel, BBC7.

Episode	Tx. Date	Tx. Time	Synopsis
1	4.3.96	22.35	Having saved the Earth from alien invasion three times, Quatermass looks forward to a peaceful retirement, but a would-be biographer puts a stop to that.
2	5.3.96	21.30	While in the real world the most pressing threat is the bomb, Quatermass confronts something even more terrifying in Westminster Abbey.
3	6.3.96	21.00	In the real world, Burgess and MacLean defect, trailing their secrets behind them. Meanwhile, Quatermass confronts the horrible secret behind a mysterious fenced-off village.
4	7.3.96	22.15	While revolution grips the world, Quatermass faces a more ominous threat in outer space.
5	8.3.96	21.40	Race riots grip the 1950s and Quatermass confronts an evil more ancient than man himself...

The Quatermass series has proved that you don't necessarily need large budgets or famous names to make a good science fiction series, but you do need good stories, and well written scripts, and thankfully Nigel Kneale knows how to write these.