Mystery and Imagination | |
---|---|
Genre | Horror anthology |
Starring | David Buck |
Country of origin | United Kingdom |
Original language | English |
No. of series | 5 |
No. of episodes | 24 (16 missing) |
Production | |
Production companies |
|
Original release | |
Network | ITV |
Release | 29 January 1966 – 23 February 1970 |
Mystery and Imagination is a British television anthology series of classic horror and supernatural dramas. Five series were broadcast from 1966 to 1970 by the ITV network and produced by ABC and (later) Thames Television. [1]
The series featured television plays based on the works of well-known authors such as Robert Louis Stevenson, Bram Stoker, Mary Shelley, M. R. James, and Edgar Allan Poe. All Bar one of the first two ABC series starred David Buck as Richard Beckett, originally a character from Sheridan Le Fanu's story "The Flying Dragon", as narrator. Beckett was made the central character of the series, taking the roles of various characters from some of the original stories. [2] The first two series, although transmitted as two separate runs, were recorded in a single production block. The episode without Buck as the lead ("The Open Door") features Jack Hawkins. Unlike BBC dramas from the period, location exterior shots were also recorded onto video tape rather than 16mm film, giving a more consistent look to the production. Only series 5 was videotaped in colour.
# | Title | Story | Original airdate |
---|---|---|---|
1 | "The Lost Stradivarius" | J. Meade Falkner | 29 January 1966 |
2 | "The Body Snatcher" | Robert Louis Stevenson | 5 February 1966 |
3 | "The Fall of the House of Usher" | Edgar Allan Poe | 12 February 1966 |
4 | "The Open Door" | Margaret Oliphant | 19 February 1966 |
5 | "The Tractate Middoth" | M. R. James | 26 February 1966 |
6 | "Lost Hearts" | M. R. James | 5 March 1966 |
7 | "The Canterville Ghost" | Oscar Wilde | 12 March 1966 |
# | Title | Story | Original airdate |
---|---|---|---|
8 | "Room 13" | M. R. James | 22 October 1966 |
9 | "The Beckoning Shadow" | Charlotte Riddell | 29 October 1966 |
10 | "The Flying Dragon" | Sheridan Le Fanu | 5 November 1966 |
11 | "Carmilla" | Sheridan Le Fanu | 12 November 1966 |
12 | "The Phantom Lover" | Vernon Lee | 19 November 1966 |
# | Title | Story | Original airdate |
---|---|---|---|
13 | "Casting the Runes" | M. R. James | 22 March 1968 |
14 | "The Listener" | Algernon Blackwood | 30 March 1968 |
15 | "A Place of One's Own" | Osbert Sitwell | 6 April 1968 |
16 | "The Devil's Piper" | Walter Scott | 13 April 1968 |
17 | "The Tell-Tale Heart" | Edgar Allan Poe | 22 June 1968 |
18 | "Feet Foremost" | L. P. Hartley | 29 June 1968 |
# | Title | Story | Original airdate |
---|---|---|---|
19 | "Uncle Silas" | Sheridan Le Fanu | 4 November 1968 |
20 | "Frankenstein" | Mary Shelley | 11 November 1968 |
21 | "Dracula" | Bram Stoker | 18 November 1968 |
# | Title | Story | Original airdate |
---|---|---|---|
22 | "The Suicide Club" | Robert Louis Stevenson | 9 February 1970 |
23 | "Sweeney Todd" | George Dibdin Pitt adaptation by Vincent Tilsey | 16 February 1970 |
24 | "The Curse of the Mummy" | Bram Stoker | 23 February 1970 |
Of the episodes from the ABC era, only the versions of "The Fall of the House of Usher" and "The Open Door" (series 1) have survived. All the other episodes from the first three series are not known to exist, although the Thames episodes (series 4 and 5) survive. [3] A brief clip from "Casting the Runes" (from series 3) also exists. Domestic audio recordings of the otherwise missing episodes "The Lost Stradivarius", "The Body Snatcher", "The Tractate Middoth", "Lost Hearts", "The Canterville Ghost" and "Room 13" also exist. These recordings have been uploaded to YouTube. [4]
Network has released all eight remaining episodes on a four disc DVD set along with the surviving clip of "Casting the Runes".
Do Not Adjust Your Set is a British television series produced originally by Rediffusion, London, and then by the fledgling Thames Television for British commercial television channel ITV from 26 December 1967 to 14 May 1969. The show took its name from the message that was displayed when there was a problem with transmission or technical difficulties.
Three's Company is an American television sitcom that aired for eight seasons on ABC from March 15, 1977, to September 18, 1984. Developed by Don Nicholl, Michael Ross and Bernie West, it is based on the British sitcom Man About the House created by Brian Cooke and Johnnie Mortimer.
A television pilot in United Kingdom and United States television, is a standalone episode of a television series that is used to sell a show to a television network or other distributor. A pilot is created to be a testing ground to gauge whether a series will be successful. It is, therefore, a test episode for the intended television series, an early step in the series development, much like pilot studies serve as precursors to the start of larger activity.
June Lockhart is an American retired actress, beginning a film career in the 1930s and 1940s in such films as A Christmas Carol and Meet Me in St. Louis. She acted primarily in 1950s and 1960s television and with performances on stage and in film. On two television series, Lassie and Lost in Space, she played mother roles. Lockhart also portrayed Dr. Janet Craig on the CBS television sitcom Petticoat Junction (1968–70). She is a two-time Emmy Award nominee and a Tony Award winner. With a career spanning nearly 90 years, Lockhart is one of the last surviving actors from the Golden Age of Hollywood.
Comedy Playhouse is a long-running British anthology series of one-off unrelated sitcoms that aired for 128 episodes from 1961 to 1975. Many episodes later graduated to their own series, including Steptoe and Son, Meet the Wife, Till Death Us Do Part, All Gas and Gaiters, Up Pompeii!, Not in Front of the Children, Me Mammy, That's Your Funeral, The Liver Birds, Are You Being Served? and particularly Last of the Summer Wine, which is the world's longest running sitcom, having run from January 1973 to August 2010. In all, 27 sitcoms started from a pilot in the Comedy Playhouse strand.
The Baron is a British television series made in 1965 and 1966, based on the book series by John Creasey and produced by ITC Entertainment. Thirty colour episodes were produced, and the show was exported to the American ABC network.
The Adventures of Ellery Queen is the title of two separate television series made in the 1950s. They are based on the fictional detective Ellery Queen and the cases he solves with his father Inspector Richard Queen.
Kraft Television Theatre is an American anthology drama television series running from 1947 to 1958. It began May 7, 1947 on NBC, airing at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday evenings until December of that year. It first promoted MacLaren's Imperial Cheese, which was advertised nowhere else. In January 1948, it moved to 9 p.m. on Wednesdays, continuing in that timeslot until 1958. Initially produced by the J. Walter Thompson advertising agency, the live hour-long series offered television plays with new stories and new characters each week, in addition to adaptations of such classics as A Christmas Carol and Alice in Wonderland. The program was broadcast live from Studio 8-H at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, currently the home of Saturday Night Live.
Michael Patrick Boatman is an American actor and writer. He is known for his roles as New York City mayoral aide Carter Heywood in the ABC sitcom Spin City, as U.S. Army Specialist Samuel Beckett in the ABC drama series China Beach, as 101st Airborne soldier Motown in the Vietnam War movie Hamburger Hill, and as sports agent Stanley Babson in the HBO sitcom Arli$$. He also starred in The Good Fight, the Paramount+ spinoff of The Good Wife.
Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense, aired in the United States as Fox Mystery Theater, is a British mystery anthology television series produced in Britain in 1984 by Hammer Film Productions. Though similar in format to the 1980 series Hammer House of Horror, the Mystery and Suspense series had feature-length episodes, usually running around 70 minutes without commercials.
The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries is an American television mystery series based on the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew juvenile novels. The series, which ran from January 30, 1977, to January 14, 1979, was produced by Glen A. Larson from Universal Television for ABC. Parker Stevenson and Shaun Cassidy starred as amateur detective brothers Frank and Joe Hardy, respectively, while Pamela Sue Martin starred as amateur sleuth Nancy Drew.
David Keith Rodney Buck was an English actor and author.
A Ghost Story for Christmas is a strand of annual British short television films originally broadcast on BBC One between 1971 and 1978, and revived sporadically by the BBC since 2005. With one exception, the original instalments were directed by Lawrence Gordon Clark and the films were all shot on 16 mm colour film. The remit behind the series was to provide a television adaptation of a classic ghost story, in line with the oral tradition of telling supernatural tales at Christmas.
Tales of Mystery was a British supernatural television drama anthology series based on the short stories of Algernon Blackwood. It was broadcast by ITV (Associated-Rediffusion) and ran over three seasons from 1961–1963. Produced by Peter Graham Scott, each episode was 25 minutes long and introduced by John Laurie. None of the 29 episodes broadcast survive in any television archive, however.
Armchair Mystery Theatre is a 60-minute UK television anthology mystery series. Thirty-four episodes aired from 1960–1965. It was hosted by Donald Pleasence and produced by Leonard White. It was a spin-off from the successful Armchair Theatre series.
"Casting the Runes" is a short story written by the English writer M. R. James. It was first published in 1911 as the fourth story in More Ghost Stories, which was James' second collection of ghost stories.
'"Casting the Runes" is the first episode of the third series of the supernatural television anthology series Mystery and Imagination produced by ABC Television in 1968. Running at 50 minutes, it was first broadcast on 22 March 1968. It was based on the ghost story "Casting the Runes" by British writer and academic M. R. James, first published in 1911 as the fourth story in More Ghost Stories, James' second collection of ghost stories. It is the first television adaptation of the story, with John Fraser as Dunning and Robert Eddison as Karswell.