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ACTION
TV ONLINE EPISODE GUIDE
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When
young solicitor Arthur Kipps is sent to the small
town of Crythin Gifford to attend to the affairs
of the recently-deceased Mrs Drablow, he expects
to encounter little more than a few dusty documents.
What he actually finds is the mysterious Woman in
Black and the horrifying story of the events that
took place on the fog-wreathed salt marshes surrounding
the bleak Eel Marsh House.
Adapted for television by veteran script-writer Nigel Kneale, The Woman in Black was based on the novel by Susan Hill and first broadcast on ITV on Christmas Eve in 1989. Inspired by classic ghost stories such as Henry James' The Turn of the Screw and the works of MR James (one chapter is actually titled Whistle and I'll Come to You), the book was first published by Hamilton in 1983 and quickly acquired its reputation as one of the best modern ghost stories in print. Kneale's script sticks closely to the original text with only relatively minor changes - rather strangely, Spider, Sam Toovey's dog, changes sex from male to female! The only significant difference between the source material and the television adaptation is in the concluding scenes. For those that aren't familiar with either version I won't spoil it for you, but I will say that it's difficult to imagine the original ending having quite the same impact as Nigel Kneale's revisions. Since its original transmission The Woman in Black has only been seen once more on British television - a Channel 4 repeat over the Christmas period in 1994. The film was released on video in the UK in 1991, although it is now long out of print. A region 1 DVD is available in Canada and the USA and can be ordered online. The book itself remains in print and should be available from any good bookshop. It has also been adapted for radio and, since 1989, has also been running in London's West End in a play adapted by Stephen Mallatratt.
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Script : Nigel Kneale based on the book by Susan Hill Director : Herbert Wise Notes : Nigel Kneale is perhaps best known for writing the various Quatermass serials which were produced in the 1950's and 1970's. Amongst the other telefantasy programmes he wrote are The Stone Tape, The Year of the Sex Olympics, the anthology series Beasts and Kinvig. He also wrote the script to the infamous 1954 adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. Bernard Hepton is probably best remembered for playing restaurant-owner Albert Foiret in the World War II drama series Secret Army. Other programmes in which he has appeared include The Six Wives of Henry VIII in which he played Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, I, Claudius and Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. He has made guest appearances in numerous shows including Out of the Unknown (The Fosters), Doomwatch (By the Pricking of My Thumbs…) and Midsomer Murders (Death of a Hollow Man). Pauline Moran has regularly appeared in the ITV adaptations of Agatha Christie's Poirot books as Miss Lemon. In 1987 she played the Queen in The Luck Child, an episode of Jim Henson's The Storyteller. William Simons is best known for playing PC Ventress in the ITV drama series Heartbeat. He has also appeared in several other telefantasy productions. In 1971 he played Quarmby in The Logical Approach, an episode of ITV's speculative drama The Guardians and in 1977 played Mandrel, the leader of the Others, in The Sun Makers, a Tom Baker-era Doctor Who story. Text © Kieran Seymour 2003.
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