Having plundered a drug store an ingested a mixture of chemicals that would normally be deadly to humans, astronaut Victor Carroon has gone missing. The Metropolitan Police, declaring the astronaut a national hero, call off the search for him. Carroon’s whereabouts are discovered soon enough: now a barely-humaniod mass of fungus, the being that was once Victor Carroon apparently took over a small island in a park. Quatermass now fears that the being may spread across Earth as an Earthly fungus would, by releasing spores. And in any case, the creature has now migrated…to the wall of Westminster Abbey.
written by Nigel Kneale
directed by Rudolph Cartier
music not creditedCast: Reginald Tate (Professor Bernard Quatermass), Isabel Dean (Judith Carroon), Duncan Lamont (Victor Carroon), Hugh Kelly (John Paterson), John Glen (Dr. Gordon Briscoe), Ian Colin (Detective Inspector Lomax), Frank Hawkins (Detective Sergeant Best), Paul Whitsun-Jones (James Fullalove), Richard Cuthbert (Chemist), Bernadette Milnes (Usherette), Christie Humphrey (Janet), John Stone (Ted), Frank Atkinson (Park Keeper), Reginald Hearne (Police Inspector), Wilfred Brambell (Drunk), Tony Van Bridge (Producer), Neal Arden (Commentator), Josphine Crombie (Secretary), John Kidd (Sir Vernon Dodds)
Notes: Beginning with this episode, the BBC began preceding episodes with content warnings advising that The Quatermass Experiment was not suitable for “children or people of a nervous disposition.” Unsatisfied with its experimental telerecording technique, the BBC only recorded the first two episodes of The Quatermass Experiment. This synopsis and the remainder of this guide to The Quatermass Experiment, out of necessity, is based upon the original scripts and remaining production paperwork.
LogBook entry by Earl Green