40 Minutes: Ghost Train

Creepy cartoons and high-ectoplasm action series are all well and good to satisfy a 21st century lust for arcane entertainment, but sooner or later what's required is actual, verified, hard evidence of the afterlife. And with that in mind, The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour turns - once more - to Auntie Beeb for some documentary fact.

This comes packaged in the form of 40 Minutes' Ghost Train: Haunted Britain, during which Messrs Velvet and Blackout rise to the seriousness of the occasion in practiced form: by discussing Doctor Who easter-eggs and mocking members of the public foolish enough to have appeared on television one time several decades ago. Because it's what the hosts are here for and let's face it, that's what you're here for too...

Did NHS funding in the 1980s get reduced to the number of sponsored EMF-meter clicks recorded in a haunted house? Can you really complain about paranormal disturbances when you've got a shotgun blast in the ceiling and a mausoleum at the bottom of your garden? And did Blackout buy the book?*

Get John Bruce to gently caress the Play button for you, and find out...

WE HAVE BEEN WATCHING:

Programme: 40 Minutes: Ghost Train
Broadcast: Thursday 02 March 1989, 21:30
Production/Channel: A BBC production for BBC 2
Editor: Jerry Leon
Research: Amanda Casson, Vivienne Rae-Ellis, Terence Whitaker, Rev. Jack Richardson
Producer/Director: Martin O'Collins
Starring: John Bruce, Helen & Mike McCormick, Rev. Jack Richardson, Ken Lobley, Nicola & Paul Thompson, Eddie Burks, SCAW Brenda Jenkinson

Of note, this week...

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The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour is a free podcast from iPorle Media, which holds production copyright. Opinions and recollections expressed are not to be taken as fact. The title and credit music is by Doctor Velvet, with additional live accompaniments by Ozzy Bognops. Audio segments from television programmes are presented for review and informational purposes only under fair use, and no ownership of these is claimed or implied by this show. Email enquiries to PeggyMountPod@gmail.com

The Fall Guy

This entire series of The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour focuses on the more macabre facets of the magic lantern partly in a bid to help clear the supernatural backlog, and because sometimes a Halloween-themed programme crops up that's just too good to leave until Spooky-Season!
(or is just too awful to take that coveted slot in the review-schedule, but let's try to be optimistic)

Worlds collide at Mountpeg Towers this week when Ozzy Bognops drops round, and explosions meet ectoplasm for The Fall Guy on 'October The 31st', the textbook snapshot of a celebrated 1980s TV show having a mid-life crisis. Yes, whether you're raising a cold beer to The Unknown Stuntman or a smouldering absinthe to The Mistress Of The Dark, the level of For-The-Dads™ televisual entertainment here is positively off the scale...

How many litres of water does it take to extinguish Sally Field? How many litres of whiskey does it take to incapacitate Colt Seavers? And how many members of the incidental cast are changing their surname to Carradine to ensure they get a screen-credit?

Grab the coroner, unearth the casket, press the Play button, and find out...

WE HAVE BEEN WATCHING:

Programme: The Fall Guy: October The 31st
Broadcast: Wednesday 31 October 1984 (U.S.)
Production/Channel: Glen A. Larson Productions / ABC Television, ITV
Writer: Sam Egan, Lou Shaw, Thomas G. Edwards
Music: Blake Shelton, Stu Phillips
Producer/Director: Glen A. Larson, Alan Crosland Jr.
Starring: Lee Majors, Douglas Barr, Heather Thomas, Cassandra Peterson, Orson Bean, Doug McClure, John Carradine, David Carradine, Keith Carradine, Robert Carradine

You can Subscribe, Like, Follow, Rate and Review on:



The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour is a free podcast from iPorle Media, which holds production copyright. Opinions and recollections expressed are not to be taken as fact. The title and credit music is by Doctor Velvet, with additional live accompaniments by Ozzy Bognops. Audio segments from television programmes are presented for review and informational purposes only under fair use, and no ownership of these is claimed or implied by this show. Email enquiries to PeggyMountPod@gmail.com

Count Duckula

The hosts of The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour are well known for chasing the boundaries of terror and for crossing the streams, and tonight's lecture illustrates that just because something appears brightly coloured, that doesn't mean it can't also be steeped in darkness.

Yes, the new series' exploratory jaunt into televisual devilry begins in earnest, and what better way to brush aside abandoned cobwebs and read ancient inscriptions aloud than in the company of Count Duckula? With vampires, zombies, tomb-looting and light jazz, there's something for fans of all horror...

What was the deal with 1980s variety club acts blagging the contracts for kids' TV theme tunes? What was the deal with Brian Trueman hoovering up any jobs that were left over? And how many gags can you pack into a script before the plot is left sitting in the studio next door?

Press Play, blow on the enchanted horn, and find out...

WE HAVE BEEN WATCHING:

Programme: Count Duckula: No Sax Please, We're Egyptian
Broadcast: Tuesday 06 September 1988, 16:45
Production/Channel: Cosgrove Hall, ITV
Writer: Brian Trueman
Music: Mike Harding
Producer/Director: Brian Cosgrove, Mark Hall / Chris Randall
Starring: David Jason, Jack May, Brian Trueman, Barry Clayton

You can Subscribe, Like, Follow, Rate and Review on:



The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour is a free podcast from iPorle Media, which holds production copyright. Opinions and recollections expressed are not to be taken as fact. The title and credit music is by Doctor Velvet, with additional live accompaniments by Ozzy Bognops. Audio segments from television programmes are presented for review and informational purposes only under fair use, and no ownership of these is claimed or implied by this show. Email enquiries to PeggyMountPod@gmail.com

Fangface / So Haunt Me

Spring may be round the corner, but it's always winter in our souls! Yes, as most normal people dare to celebrate the evenings getting ever so slowly lighter, The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour draws the heavy brocade curtains, lights a candle or two and reclines further into the misanthropic gloom. It certainly beats going outside, where the real horror lies.

In this extended trailer for their NEW SUPERNATURAL SERIES, Messrs Velvet, Blackout and Bognops move the glass of nostalgic criticism over the animated lycanthropic-farce Fangface, and try to make contact with BBC1's 1992 sitcom So Haunt Me. If there really *is* somebody there, all will be revealed After Dark...

How many stars of Capcom had a Before-They-Were-Famous career at Ruby-Spears? How many online auctions of original animation-cells would you have to win before you become the rights-holder of a cartoon? And how many sitcom-dads does it take sitting round the table until they can see the ghost?

Watch agog as an unseen spectral hand presses the Play button, and find out...

WE HAVE BEEN WATCHING:

Programme: Fangface
Broadcast: Saturday 05 April 1980, 09:40
Production/Channel: Ruby-Spears/ABC, ITV
Writer: Norman Maurer, Mark Jones, Cliff Ruby & Elana Lesser
Music: Dean Elliott
Producer/Director: Jerry Eisenberg, Rudy Larriva
Starring: Frank Welker, Susan Blu, Bart Braverman, Jerry Dexter

Programme: So Haunt Me
Broadcast: Sunday 23 February 1992, 20:35
Production/Channel: Cinema Verity, BBC One
Writer: Paul Mendelson
Music: Rolfe Kent
Producer/Director: Caroline Gold / Verity Lambert, John Stroud
Starring: Miriam Karlin, Tessa Peake-Jones, George Costigan, Laura Simmons, Jeremy Green, Cheryl Hall

To note, this week...

You can Subscribe, Like, Follow, Rate and Review on:



The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour is a free podcast from iPorle Media, which holds production copyright. Opinions and recollections expressed are not to be taken as fact. The title and credit music is by Doctor Velvet, with additional live accompaniments by Ozzy Bognops. Audio segments from television programmes are presented for review and informational purposes only under fair use, and no ownership of these is claimed or implied by this show. Email enquiries to PeggyMountPod@gmail.com