Voice From The Gallows / The Ice House

Ah, the sound of hooves clopping across the rooftops and a smell of pumpkins and absinthe left out for Father Samhain can mean only one thing: it is truly the most woe-nderful time of the year! The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour’s Halloween Special reaches once more into the casket for only the finest knitwear, slacks and bejewelled shawls, because here we dress for dinner...

Our hosts begin by venturing - as is so oft the case – off down the old pub, where a Voice From The Gallows ensures the spirits they find aren’t just restricted to Harry Hewart’s decanter collection. Following these rather alarming events, a check-in at a luxury country spa retreat is called for, with the charming if rather eccentric regulars keeping the gin cooled down at The Ice House.

How many eggs does someone have to smash before you realise that the RightMove summary may not have been entirely transparent about the history of this house? How many phallic symbols have to be smeared on your bedroom window before you realise that the TripAdvisor review may not have been entirely representative of this hotel? And how many times to we have to petition LWT for a Diamond Lady spin-off sitcom?

Gently press the Play button with a croquet mallet and/or mell hammer, and find out…

WE HAVE BEEN WATCHING:

Programme: Worlds Beyond: Voice From The Gallows
Broadcast: Friday 10 October 1986
Production/Channel: George Walker Television Prod, Thames Television, ITV
Writer: Brian Clemens
Music: Ian Stanley, Darryl Way
Producer/Director: Alan Radnor, Bob McIntosh / Sue Butterworth
Starring: Darren McGavin, Connie Booth, Dannelle Saunders, James Aubrey, James Hazeldine

Programme: A Ghost Story For Christmas: The Ice House
Broadcast: Monday 25 December 1978, 23:35
Production/Channel: BBC Television, BBC One
Writer: John Bowen
Producer/Director: Rosemary Hill / Derek Lister
Starring: John Stride, Elizabeth Romilly, Geoffrey Burridge, David Beames, Gladys Spencer (DIAMOND LADY)

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

Murder She Wrote

Ah, the haunting season seems to arrive earlier every year, and what better way to avoid the hustle and bustle of shoppers laden with absinthe, last minute pumpkins and Tripe Trifle™ than to join the hosts of The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour as they lean into the dark nights with some terrifying television?

This year's Hallowe’en special is a callback to the podcast's formative roots, as Murder She Wrote's Night Of The Tarantula comes under supernatural scrutiny. Leaving the good folk of Cabot Cove to manage without her for a few days, Jessica Fletcher takes a jaunt down to Jamaica to visit an old friend. But while she's packed the sort of wardrobe that could be used as an Ishihara test, it soon becomes apparent that Jess has forgotten to bring the spider-repellent. And the snake-repellent. Oh, and zombie-repellent…

How many glasses of wine can you get out of a bottle from the duty free at Sangster International airport? How many different accents can you crowbar into a single mansion lived in by one family? And how many lines in the sand has Danny La Rue crossed for Angela Lansbury to dish out this sort of theatrical vitriol?

Press Play before Arnold races out of the door, and find out…

WE HAVE BEEN WATCHING:

Programme: Murder She Wrote
Broadcast: Friday 02 November 1990, 20:00
Production/Channel: Universal Television, ITV Network
Writer: Chris Manheim
Music: David Bell, John Addison
Producer/Director: Robert E Swanson, Robert Van Scoyk / Vincent McEveety
Starring: Angela Lansbury, John Rhys-Davies, Shani Wallis, Grand L Bush, Cheryl Arutt, Nancy Valen, Hurd Hatfield, Ji-Tu Cumbuka, Patrick Massett, James Lancaster

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

The Hamlyn Book of Horror

Unearthing horrors from the past is of course the default setting at The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour, so Hallow'een makes that especially enjoyable. And what could be nicer on a wet, grey autumnal evening than a dram of something potent and a book by the fireside?

The second of this year's supernatural specials is but a turn of the page away, as Doctor Velvet and Blackout creak open the eldritch tome of 1979's Hamlyn Book Of Horror, suppressing the hard-wired fear of more than four decades to give it another pass...

How does a book which is already largely a historical study age over the decades, when compared with an evolving cultural appreciation of its original source material? Is the the compulsion to scare oneself with un-nerving media as universal and timeless as the horror-genre would suggest, or does it only feel that way to people already predisposed toward it? And can a book really give you the diarrhoea?

Light the thirteenth candle, press Play and see what answers float through the aether...

WE HAVE BEEN READING:

Programme: The Hamlyn Book of Horror
Published: July 27th 1979, hardcover.
Publisher: Hamlyn
Author: Daniel Farson
Illustrations: 'The Hamlyn Publishing Group Limited'. Outrageous.
Featuring: Christopher Lee, Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, Max Schreck, Bram Stoker, Mary Shelley, Edgar Allen Poe, M.R.James, Robert Louis Stevenson, Montague Summers and his absolutely magnificent hair.

...and these are the things we see when we close our eyes...

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

Mad Monster Party

Why, it seems to come around earlier each year! Yes, as the decorations go up once again and the dark nights seep firmly in to our homes and our very souls, The Peggy Mount Calamity Hour returns for another unholy trinity of Hallow'een themed podcast episodes to keep a chill in your spine as you shiver 'til dawn.

It's back to the video shop first of all, with Rankin/Bass's 1967 animated cabal Mad Monster Party coming under the critical eye of Doctor Velvet and Blackout, casting new judgement on classic creatures...

Is it really that important to spend time working on the music and the comedy when you're putting together a musical comedy? Is the climactic euthanasia of a range of x-rated villains really a fitting subject for animated entertainment which will be a draw to a young audience? And is Phyllis Diller the ultimate, unabashed, unsanitisable horror?

The answers - like the drinks - are but a tap away and not for the faint of heart...

WE HAVE BEEN WATCHING:

Programme: Mad Monster Party
Release/Broadcast: 18 Oct 1967 (UK cinemas), 30 May 1983 (ITV), 07 Apr 1994 (Channel 4)
Production: Rankin/Bass
Writer: Len Korobkin, Harvey Kurtzman, Arthur Rankin Jr.
Music: Maury Laws, Ethel Ennis
Producer/Director: Arthur Rankin Jr. / Jules Bass
Starring: Boris Karloff, Gale Garnett, Phyllis Diller, Allen Swift

...and this is what happens when you have two model-making teams not talking to each other:

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

Scooby-Doo / Tales Of The Unexpected

Gather round! It is time once more to bob your apples, carve some pumpkins and get them treats tricked, as our cauldron is stirred for a generous and potentially lethal helping of the home-brewed Peggy Mount Calamity Hour's Hallow'een Special! Yes, there's just time before the Feast Of All Saints to get your fangs stuck into a couple of spooky morsels, whether it's out of hunger for untold riches, long-sought vengeance or just a liverwurst and ice cream sandwich.

The moonlit streets of California are our first stop-off, as a gang of young paranormal investigators solve the riddle of the tombs as best they can whilst also enquiring as to the present whereabouts of Scooby-Doo (p1/2/3). And then it's a short train ride into East Anglia, where mirth, merriment and magic combine to mask the more sinister intentions of Derek Jacobi's Stranger In Town...

Which battle-attired porcine-fronted hostelry in Norfolk finds itself the unwitting focus of an unsolicited endorsement campaign? Is there no end to the lengths to which some ingeniously theatrical criminals will go, when a simple night-time ram raid and/or sniper rifle would probably get the same job done more efficiently? And come on, is that *really* not what we expected?

Press Play to find out, if you dare...

Subscribe/Like/Follow 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. 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