Dying of Fright from The Creeping Unknown (1956)

One of the ten best horror movies I ever saw was The Creeping Unknown (1956), also known to many as The Quatermass Experiment. The film concerns three astronauts who have been launched into space aboard a single stage to orbit in a rocket designed by Professor Quatermass. It crash lands with only one of its original crew, Victor Carroon, still aboard. No one knows whatever became of the rest of the crew, so Professor Quatermass begins investigating. The survivor, however, has a strange fungus under his fingernails, which slowly spreads on his hand, then his arm. It does not take long for the good professor to figure out the survivor is mutating into an alien organism, which, if it spawns, will engulf the Earth and destroy humanity. The survivor, driven mad from the ordeal, escapes the hospital and flees the British countryside where the manhunt involved Inspector Lomax of Scotland Yard. The finale, obviously, involves a fully-developed creature of true horror and an ending that ranks up there in popularity as the destruction of the Washington Monument (Earth vs. the Flying Saucers) and the destruction of the San Francisco Bridge (It Came From Beneath the Sea).

 

The Quatermass Experiment was originally a six-part TV serial telecast live over the BBC in 1953. Regrettably, preservation was not applied over the years and only the first two chapters of the television serial exist in recorded form. Written by Nigel Kneale, the television serial was an enormous success with critics and audiences alike, later described by film historian Robert Simpson as “event television, emptying the streets and pubs.” Among its viewers was Hammer Films producer Anthony Hinds, who was immediately keen to buy the rights for a film version. Incorporated in 1934, Hammer had developed a niche for itself making second features, many of which were adaptations of successful BBC Radio productions. Hammer contacted the BBC on August 24, 1953, two days after the transmission of the final episode, to inquire about the film rights and a motion-picture was produced with American actor Brian Donlevy playing Professor Quatermass.

 

Timed to coincide with the broadcast of the television sequel, Quatermass II, the motion-picture went on general release in movie theaters in the United Kingdom on November 20, 1955. In the United States, Robert L. Lippert attempted to interest Columbia Pictures in distributing the film but they felt it would be competition for their own production, It Came from Beneath the Sea, which was on release at the time. Because The Quatermass Experiment was unknown in the United States, Lippert renamed the motion-picture Shock!  

 

Unable to secure a sale, Lippert retitled it again, this time to The Creeping Unknown. United Artists eventually acquired the distribution rights in March of 1956 for a fee of $125,000, and the movie was packaged in a double bill with another horror movie called The Black Sleep, starring Basil Rathbone, Bela Lugosi and Lon Chaney, Jr. Four minutes, mainly of expository material, were cut from the runtime of the film, which means there are two versions of the movie, each with a different title and four minutes difference in length. Whichever version you watch today, however, does not affect the impact of the film’s emotional pull. 

 

The Creeping Unknown opened in theatres in the United States in June of 1956 and was so successful that United Artists offered to part-fund a sequel based on the second television series. Ultimately the Quartermass series became a franchise with additional sequels (including a big screen movie starring Barbara Shelley titled Quatermass and the Pit). 

 

This film easily ranks as one of my top ten favorite horror/science fiction classics and is a must-see. The film also includes a bit of trivia: The Guinness Book of World Records subsequently recorded this movie as the only known case of an audience member dying of fright while watching a horror film.

 

Variety magazine, November 7, 1956

 

John W. Campbell's Frozen Hell

Few science fiction tales have left as lasting an imprint as the 1938 novella that later inspired the films collectively known as The Thing. Though the original title may not be familiar to everyone, the story’s cinematic legacy has endured through three major adaptations: the 1951 The Thing from Another World directed by Howard Hawks with James Arness, John Carpenter’s 1982 version starring Kurt Russell, and the 2011 prequel directed by Matthijs van Heijningen.

The tale originated from one of early sci-fi’s most influential figures, a writer-turned-editor who, after 1938, shifted from authorship to shaping the future of the genre through his magazine Astounding Stories—later retitled Astounding Science Fiction and finally Analog. Under his guidance, rising talents such as Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, L. Sprague de Camp, Lester del Rey, and Theodore Sturgeon found their voices. They say a magazine is only as good as the editor and Campbell was among the best of the editors for science-fiction magazines.

For decades, readers assumed they knew the complete story—until a longer, forgotten version surfaced in the archives of Harvard University. This expanded manuscript, running nearly forty-five pages beyond the published novella, was finally released in 2019 under its original name, Frozen Hell, by Wildside Press. The edition features a preface by Alec Nevala-Lee, an introduction by Robert Silverberg, illustrations by Bob Eggleton, and editing by John Gregory Betancourt. Nevala-Lee and Silverberg recount the discovery of the manuscript, its relation to an earlier tale titled “The Brain-Stealers of Mars,” and the editorial decisions that streamlined the shorter version for faster pacing.

In Frozen Hell, the isolation and tension unfold more gradually. A team of scientists working in the Antarctic unearths a buried spacecraft composed of an unknown alloy. Within the wreckage lies a grotesque life form locked in ice—an ancient being unlike anything on Earth. When the researchers bring the specimen back to camp, intending to thaw and examine it, the situation spirals into horror. The creature revives—and worse, it possesses the terrifying ability to imitate any living organism it touches.

At its core, Frozen Hell is a cautionary meditation on curiosity and consequence: a stark reminder that some discoveries are better left entombed beneath the ice. If you are a fan of the story, this extended version is worth reading.

THE WITCH'S TALE (1933 - 1938) Clipping File

One of my favorite radio programs is The Witch’s Tale, a weekly horror program that aired from May 21, 1931, to June 13, 1938. The program was created, written, and directed by Alonzo Deen Cole, who also wrote for such programs as The Shadow and Casey, Crime Photographer. Cole's spooky show was hosted by Old Nancy, the Witch of Salem, who introduced a different terror tale each week. She was among the earliest of radio horror hosts and, ironically, for a time played by a 13-year-old actress names Miriam Wolfe.

 

The majority of the scripts were original stories, but there were literary adaptations as well, such as adaptations of Dracula and Frankenstein. But the best of them are some of Cole’s originals such as “The Devil’s Mask,” which featured a flaming skeleton running around screaming maniacally, and “The Entomologist,” about a mad scientist who planned to rule the world with giant vampire spiders. What I enjoy even more are the productions -- even the music is similar to the type you hear on Universal Studios monster movies.

 

In November 1936, Alonzo Deen Cole edited The Witch’s Tales (plural, not singular), a pulp magazine with short stories which were adaptations of his radio scripts. There were a total of two issues published. Those two issues go for huge prices when available for sale.

 

In the ongoing process of scanning newspaper clippings and magazine articles, enclosed is a clipping file in PDF for The Witch’s Tale, with a surprise included.

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/i3z1964q112qd6d/Witch%27s%20Tale%20%28clipping%20file%29%20%231.pdf?dl=0

More TV Guide Trivia from 1959

During the 1950s and 1960s, TV Guide featured a minimum of two pages of news blurbs related to television programming and television personalities. Many of these blurbs were word through the Hollywood grapevine, some reprinted from Variety and Broadcasting magazine. While these items are of historical note, sometimes providing the reasoning for programming changes or unusual casting, a number of blurbs provide us with fascinating trivia.

Reprinted below are a number of those news blurbs from 1959, for programming decisions that never happened. Information in Italics is from me, clarifying what did happen during the course of events.

 

July 4, 1959

Sherry Jackson will be in Japan making the test film for an around-the-world series, ADVENTURES OF SHERRY.

 

June 13, 1959

MGM and Peter Lawford are planning a feature picture, The Thin Man, based on Lawford’s television series of the same name, which is based on the old MGM feature, The Thin Man.

 

June 6, 1959

CBS Films still trying to sell the Clare Boothe Luce series, THE DIPLOMAT, even though Mrs. Luce has resigned as ambassador to Brazil. (April 11) Clare Boothe Luce set as hostess and narrator for THE DIPLOMAT, new CBS Films adventure series about foreign service officers. If Mrs. Luce is confirmed as ambassador to Brazil, her introductions will be filmed there. Sponsor must be approved by her and the State Department.

 

May 9, 1959

Actors Arthur Kennedy and Nick Adams have plans to produce, but not appear in, an anthology series, Conquerors on Horseback, with a theme: horsemen.

 

October 3, 1959

Andy Devine, long-time Jingles in the WILD BILL HICKOK series, has plans for a new show of his own, BIG JAKE.

 

April 4, 1959

Series based on the Beetle Bailey comic strip being submitted to comedian Mort Sahl.

 

October 3, 1959

NBC has financed the test tape for a planned hour-long series, THE WITNESS, based on characters brought before various investigating committees in these and other times.

 

October 3, 1959

Another hour-long series, based on the 1947 British movie, GREEN FOR DANGER, is in preparation.