For the latest Screen International article on The Awakening go to FILMS on the menu on the left, then click on THE AWAKENING. The page has the full report as a PDF, including this latest photograph of Rebecca Hall in the lead role as psychical investigator Florence Cathcart.
You might be interested also to read the authors' notes on the stories in the forthcoming anthology Never Again, edited by Joel Lane and Allyson Bird. (The book contains a reprint of my short story "After The Ape".)
Meanwhile... Cinema Futura, Mark Morris's highly anticipated anthology of non-fiction pieces by a wide variety of genre writers on their favourite SF films, will be launched by PS Publications at FantasyCon in Nottingham next month. My own piece on one of my favourite movies, Westworld, features, but here is the full, mouthwatering table of contents and list of contributors.
11 August 2010
Here's a link to a podcast of the panel discussion I moderated at Alt.Fiction in Derby earlier this year on the subject of Writing for Television. The panel consisted of myself, Robert Shearman (Born and Bred, Doctor Who), Mark Chadbourne (Doctors), and producer Bill Boyes (Quatermass, Wire in the Blood).
02 August 2010
"Most Surpising Ghostwatch News Of The Year Award" goes to 16 Ghostwatch (feat. Pipes) which is no less than a rap single, yes, you read that right: a rap single based on Ghostwatch! ...Staggered? I was! Yes, Pipes the poltergeist has been reinvented as a rap artist, thanks to Dick Limerick Academy, who have created an impressive (if dubious) mix in their new album Merseycide. Take a listen folks, if only for the sampling of strictly copyright material.
In additional GW news, I recently found an interesting new review of Ghostwatch over here at TV Tropes.
Plus there's this great new graphic image created by Arfon Jones from the Ghostwatch: Behind The Curtains web site. Many thanks, Arfon!
24 July 2010
Simon Marshall Jones asked me to write a "Guest Blog" for his web site Ramblings Of A Tattooed Head. Here it is, on the subject of the strange and contradictory feelings on the experience of visiting the set of films "wot I wrote". Hope you enjoy it.
23 July 2010
Massive thanks to Neil Snowdon for letting me know that Gothic has been highly praised by no other than the most vocal enfants terrible of science fiction, the editor of the ground breaking anthology Dangerous Visions, HARLAN ELLISON!
He says (in Harlan Ellison's Watching:) "...I treasure this film. So may you. If you, as am I, are out of your head... you will cleave to this tortured bit of cinematic epilepsy because it is ALIVE... I came away from Gothic with my soul on fire... because it is dangerously conceived, impudently mounted, uncaring of its footing, determined to crawl the wall or tumble into the abyss, all in the name of disgorging the absurd demon in thought." Marvellous!
Read the full extract of Harlan on Gothic by clicking this pdf.19 July 2010
The highly-anticipated anthology Never Again is now open for pre-orders. For more details and to view the complete table of contents and list of contributing authors (including yours truly), click this web page.
14 July 2010
Click on this for a substantial new interview with me as a special feature on the "Black static" web site. Questions asked by the excellent Andy Hedgecock. I'm particularly pleased by this one. Andy is a particularly perceptive and thoughtful interviewer and I think he gets to the core of my work, in many ways. Recommended.
Also, a brief interview by Charles Tan about my Shirley Jackson Award-nominated novella, on the Shirley Jackson Awards blog, here.
09 July 2010
Visited the set of The Awakening on Wednesday, in Trinity Church Square, Borough, South London. Impressive to see the huge crew and all the vintage cars, lots of extras in 1920s costume, urchins, rag and bone carts, grit covering yellow lines, opium dealers, rain machines, etc, etc. Met the director Nick Murphy (briefly) for the first time, and star Rebecca Hall, also did a quick interview with Baz Bamigboye, Daily Mail's "showbiz" editor.
Lady passers-by.
BBC Films make rain. Urchins look on.
Getting ready for a tracking shot.
Producer David Thompson. (Not his car.)
Widescreen. Yummy.
Opium, anyone?
Hello, hello.
The long arm of the law?
Spiffing wheels.
Spiffing haircut.
Drug Enforcement Agency, circa 1921.
05 July 2010
Tickettyboo to announce that my short story "After The Ape" (yes, that one from the BFS Yearbook) will be included in the anti-fascist themed anthology Never Again, edited by Allyson Bird and Joel Lane. It's out in September from Gray Friar Press. This is a great and laudable project, the profits of which are going to relevant charities, including the Sophie Lancaster Foundation. As the editors say "Weird fiction is often stigamtised as a reactionary and ignorant genre -- we know better". We do! Hopefully the wider reading public will know, too, after this book.
14 June 2010
Great to hear I've just got another nomination for Vardoger, this time in the best novella category of the British Fantasy Awards: yet again up against the excellent writers Sarah Pinborough and Joel Lane and another mate, Robert (Doctor Who) Shearman. As Sarah says, it's nice to feel that, whoever wins, you'll be happy! ...I'll second that!
13 June 2010
Alt.fiction in Derby was a great weekend, if far too brief. An indication of the fun we had is indicated by the following photo of respected TV producer Bill Boyes doing his Jordan impression - with a little help from the "Bosom Brothers" (my good self and Mr T. Lebbon)
Meanwhile, on a slightly more serious note: another interview about Rebecca Hall here. She mention that she's shortly to be filming The Awakening in Scotland. (Though the interviewer calls it a "supernatural thriller", it's actually a plain old ghost story, IMHO.)
1 June 2010
Really, really chuffed to announce that my story "After the Ape" has been selected for inclusion in Mammoth Book of Best New Horror: Volume 21, latest in the award-winning series edited by Stephen Jones. It will be published in paperback by Robinson in the UK and Running Press in the USA this coming autumn. It's always a cracking collection. Pre-book it here.
Also, a brand new story, "Easter" will be appearing shortly in Gary Fry's new themed anthology from Gray Friar Press, Where the Heart Is. It's an unusual story for me and I'm very proud of it. Other contributors include: Allen Ashley, D F Lewis, Andrew Hook, Rhys Hughes, Mike O'Driscoll, Joel Lane, Mark West, Stephen Bacon, Simon Bestwick, Paul Finch, John Travis, Simon Kurt Unsworth, Gary McMahon and Carole Johnstone. The theme is home and what that word conjures in the minds of the writers above. More details here.
26 May 2010
Exclusive new interview with me by Martyn Conterio on Filmshaft.com covering my new feature film The Awakening, working with Ken Russell on Gothic and William Friedkin on The Guardian, film versus television from a writer's perspective, and assorted other goodies (if you're interested in that kind of thing!) includings Things To Come.
21 May 2010
A nice recommendation of my work from Yellowed Pages.
20 May 2010
STOP PRESS!! BIG NEWSFLASH!! FEATURE FILM ANNOUNCEMENT!!
Rebecca Hall, Dominic West and Imenda Staunton have all been signed to star in the film I co-wrote with director Nick Murphy, variously called The Interpretation of Ghosts, then The Buried, and now called The Awakening.
It marks the feature directorial debut of UK TV director Murphy, who made the stunning BBC1 television mini-series Occupation, in my opinion the best thing to appear on TV last year. David M. Thompson, whose Origin Pictures developed the project at BBC Films, is producing. StudioCanal Features will be lead financier alongside BBC Films and Scottish Screen, StudioCanal is launching sales at Cannes.
BBC Films' Joe Oppenheimer is executive producing alongside Will Clarke and Jenny Borgars of StudioCanal's UK distribution and production arm, Optimum Releasing.
"This is a riveting and very original script and we are thrilled that it is to be directed by Nick Murphy as his first feature," said David Thompson, whose first film from Origin, Justin Chadwick's The First Grader, is in post-production.
Rising star Rebecca Hall (Wide Sargasso Sea) is currently on US screens in Please Give and will next be seen in Ben Affleck's The Town. Dominic West is best known for his lead role in The Wire, and Imenda Staunton for Vera Drake.
Read coverage of the Cannes announcement at Empire Online.
Heyuguys.co.uk says: "Those in any doubt of the legitimacy of the creative team behind this one need look no further than the man who has co-written the script: Stephen Volk... He is among the very few writers to literally chill me with his prose. I have very high hopes for this one."
The Awakening will be shooting in Scotland in June 2010.
FOR SYNOPSIS SEE UNDER "FILMS" ON THIS WEB SITE
19 May 2010
This is a podcast I recorded recently: an interview with me by some parapsychologists on the Righteous Indignation web site, on Ghostwatch and how a skeptical person comes to write things he doesn't believe in. To listen, click on "Read more", go to "Episode 48" and click "Play". The interview with me begins at around 29.50.
17 May 2010
I will be having a new story, "In The Colosseum" appearing in the forthcoming themed anthology The End of the Line, launched on November 15 in both the UK and USA. Price: £7.99. This is the rather splendid cover:
Other contributors with dark tales set on and around the underground include: Ramsey Campbell, Christopher Fowler, Gary McMahon, Simon Bestwick, Mark Morris, Adam Nevill, Al Ewing and many others. The anthology from Solaris Books is edited by Jonathan Oliver.
Meanwhile, changing the subject slightly, an interesting blog on Ghostwatch on this blogspot, interestingly called "Look out! He's Got A Knife!"
25 April 2010
A thoughtful acknowledgement of my latest Electric Darkness piece in Black Static #16, by Colin Harvey of Suite 101. He says, amongst other things: "Black Static is a great magazine, and #16 is an exemplary issue, but in any case this month's Electric Darkness alone is worth the cover price." Thanks, Colin. Read his comments here.
19 April 2010
Just to let anybody who's interested know that I will be appearing at a one-day event, Alt.Fiction (Derby's Festival of Alternative Fiction), to be held in Derby on 12 July. Alongside me will be a whole host of names from the field of British "imaginative fiction" such as Mark Morris, Sarah Pinborough, Guy Adams, Robert Shearman, Peter Crowther, Tim Lebbon, Steve Jones, Conrad Williams and Graham Joyce. In particular BBC Books will be promotiong their Doctor Who, Torchwood and Being Human novels. Check out details via the link above.
18 April 2010
I've been away (getting my car broken into, amongst other things...) so I'm remiss in reporting the wonderful surprise that I have been nominated for a 2009 Shirley Jackson Award, for Best Novella (Vardoger, published by Gray Friar Press). The awards were established in the name of the legendary author of The Haunting of Hill House to recognise "outstanding achievments in the literature of psychological suspense, horror and the dark fantastic". I'm also delighted that other nominees in various categories include my friends Rob Shearman, Joel Lane, Sarah Pinborough, (editors) Tim Lebbon and Chris Golden, and those nice people at Ash Tree Press.
14 April 2010
There's a substantial section on Afterlife in genre fan Steven Savile's excellent book, Fantastic TV: 50 Years of Cult Fantasy and Science Fiction (Plexus, 2010). It covers every genre show from Doctor Who to Heroes. I also contribute several diatribes and opinions to the mass writer interview section (Joe Ahearne, Paul Cornell, Andrew Cartmel) towards the end of the book. Highly recommended! Plus...
Ghostwatch gets a hefty name check by Oren Peli, director of the scary mega-hit Paranormal Activity, who gave a tour of this DVD collection in London's "Time Out" magazine (1-7 April). Q: What currently unavailable films or TV shows would you love to see on DVD? A: Ghostwatch (1992) isn't available in the US, although I've already seen it.
12 April 2010
Nice to discover today that I have no less than 4 Honorable Mentions in Ellen Datlow's "Best Horror of the Year 2". Namely, for "After the Ape" (BFS Yearbook); "Fear" (Black Static 9); "From The Lips of Lazarus" (Exotic Gothic 3); and "Hounded" (Gaslight Grotesque). Thanks, Ellen!
1 April 2010
Yay!!!!! Finally I can announce TODAY the astounding news that both "Pipes" (from Ghostwatch) and myself are going to appear in a future episode of The Simpsons! It's all very exciting!!!!!
Brilliant (if unflattering) version of me on the left! See this link for more information.
1 April 2010
Had a great time at the World Horror Convention (Brighton) last weekend. Much imbibing occurred, together with late nights and some odd experiences. Result? Sore throat and lurgy... but a small price to pay for meeting my heroes Christopher Fowler and Kim Newman for the first time, and new blood Rio Youers, as well as plentiful old mates including Tim Lebbon, Mark Morris, Paul and Marie, Simon Clark and Simon Kurt Unsworth, the genius that is Rob Shearman, the Canadian contingent Charles and Kris Prepolec and Christopher, Tim and Barbara Roden (not to mention many others!).
(From top: Paul Kane and me; me reading a story; me, Rio Youers, Rob Shearman and Mark Morris at Stephen Jones's celebratory bash; me at Simon Kurt Unsworth's signing; Kim Newman attacking Sarah Pinborough in the nicest possible way.)
Also, Christopher Fowler commented on his blog that he particularly liked my business card! (No, Chris, it isn't me with the saw!)
20 March 2010
This morning Ghostwatch was discussed (and praised) by Andy Nyman and Jeremy Dyson (authors of the play Ghost Stories: see below) on Jonathon Ross's show on BBC Radio 2. You can listen to the whole interview here. Andy and Jeremy start at around 1.27 minutes in. They talk about Ghostwatch (and me) at around 1.39 minutes in. But listen to the whole interview: they are great ambassadors of Horror!
19 March 2010
It must be this damned hoax Russian invasion of Georgia. Because Ghostwatch featured in the comedy news quiz The Bubble on BBC 2 last night. You can watch it on i-player if you go through the following link. Move the cursor to around 6.50, following the end of the hoax invasion news clip. Host David Mitchell said: "If I'd seen Sarah Greene and a ghost called Pipes, I'd have shat myself!"
15 March 2010
Mention of my BBC "hoax" drama Ghostwatch in this article Bad News: Broadcast Hoaxes in The Guardian, dated yesterday. Along with Orson Welles and sgaghetti plantations, of course...
13 March 2010
Wow. A wonderful review by Peter Tennant of my story "After The Ape", which appeared in the BFS Yearbook 2009. He says:
This is one of the best stories I've seen from the pen of writer Stephen Volk, and the best story that I've read so far this year, bar none. A story that records the aftermath of King Kong's death in New York, there are echoes here both of 9/11, another time when the Big Apple found itself under the cosh, and a foreshadowing of the horrors of fascism that lay in wait for the world of 1933, seen most obviously in the character of a lowly hotel employee of Germanic background who deplores the decadence and weakness of America even as he fucks Ann Darrow and indulges in romantic and self-deluding fantasies of taking her away from it all. The story belongs to Darrow though, the woman who loved the great ape, but it neatly sidesteps the schmaltz and sentimentality of the Jackson reinvention, giving us the back story of a woman who has suffered at the hands of men, used and abused in her personal and professional life. The miracle is not that Darrow could love Kong, but that with her history she could still feel at all, and in the aftermath of Kong's death she is almost an automaton, emotionally numb and simply going through the motions, no longer caring what happens to her, a detachment captured perfectly by Volk's prose and the actions it portrays. This is a tragedy, and it can end in only one way, and Volk doesn't flinch. Beauty killed the beast, but beauty too must die.
The same story also gets a very favourable mention on In The Gloaming Podcasts, putting it second only to Rob Shearman's "George Clooney's Moustache" in the anthology. (Which is flattery indeed, in my book!)
9 March 2010
I was sooooooo delighted to be one of the questions in the Horror Quiz in the programme for "Ghost Stories", the marvellous new theatrical creation by Andy Nyman and Jeremy Dyson now showing at the Lyric, Hammersmith. Q17: "What is the name of the ghost in the BBC's seminal drama Ghostwatch?" Go see the show. I saw it last night. It's great, creepy fun. Truly, not to be missed. For more details about "Ghost Stories" at the Lyric, click here
7 March 2010
I can now also be contacted on the British Fantasy Society Forum at the newly set up board called "Ask the Authors". Drop by. I'm in good company. Here is the link.
My Rhondda Radio interview will now be taking place on Tuesday (9 March) at 10PM. Listen online at: www.rhonddaradio.com.
Also, some really nice words about me and my work on Undead Backbrain (roberthood.net) (Robert has, like me, written a story for Exotic Gothic 3: scroll down to "News" for 29 December last.)
16 February 2010
As I posted recently on FaceBook, the gallery piece I created with my wife Pat, our "Cabinet of the Lost & Found", has caused quite a stir at New Brewery Arts in Cirencester. Two visitors said they were "APPALLED!" by it and thought it should be "BURNT!" (no less). Why? I can only presume it's because one of the drawers contains a syringe labelled "Blood of a fallen angel". Well... as they say in showbiz: Thats' Cirencester.
10 February 2010
Congratulations to Tim Lebbon, Chris Golden and James Moore, editors of "British Invasion", a cracking anthology which made it onto the Bram Stoker Awards longlist of the Horror Writers Association. (I'm proud to have written the Introduction.)
5 February 2010
Delighted with the review of my novella "Vardoger" at this this web site.
3 February 2010
You can read all about my personal selection of Horror's "Hidden Treasures" in the new SFX Magazine Horror Special. In shops now!
28 January 2010
A future screening of "Ghostwatch" plus Q&A with myself and director Lesley Manning in Camden, London, 11 May 2010. For more details go to: www.theinvisibledot.com.
9 January 2010
Check out this link to CKUA radio: an interview with Jeff Campbell and Charles Prepolec, editors of "Gaslight Grotesque: Nightmare Tales of Sherlock Holmes" discussing my story in that collection: "Hounded".
29 December 2009
You can read my latest short story, called "From The Lips of Lazarus", in Exotic Gothic 3 edited by Danel Olson, published by Ash Tree Press. (This is actually an extract from an as-yet unpublished novel The Gospel According To Lazarus.) The anthology also contains stories by, amongst others, my mates Steve Duffy, Simon Clark, Simon Kurt Unsworth, Adam Nevill and Barbara Roden.
23 December 2009
Mark Kermode has taken Ghostwatch's name in vain! How dare he! Anyway, he who laughs last... heh, heh... and thanks for this Xmas re-edit, Rich! Merry Christmas, Ghostwatchers! :-)
22 December 2009
Article about Sherlock Holmes, editors Charles Prepolec and Jeff Campbell, and the anthology "Gaslight Grotesque" (containing my story "Hounded") in the Calgary Herald.
5 December 2009
Just found this comment on Mark Kermode's blog (BBC film critic):
"It's not just you, Mark. I too wasn't particularly scared by Paranormal Activity, although I admit that there were a couple of nice jumpy moments.
"And I think it's for the same general reason - when you've seen the tricks before, then the shock value is infinitely less. The comparison for me is with the amazing BBC TV drama from 20-odd years ago "Ghostwatch" which used much the same techniques - start out with little things and gradually crank it up. Although that was far more scary because it was presented as a "live" studio show, not as a drama, which a movie can never manage."
1 December 2009
Wow!! Today a review in The Stage said that this year's biggest mega-smash supernatural hit movie Paranormal Activity isn't as scary as my own Ghostwatch. "What really killed it for me was the thought I'd seen the whole concept done so much better. By the BBC, in fact, in 1992's Ghostwatch."
Paranormal Activity? Pah. Sarah Greene is scarier
31 October 2009
If you fancy watching the whole of Ghostwatch courtesy of YouTube, click here
If you'd like to read about Halloween and Ghostwatch on Britishfilms.com, click here
If you'd like to read Peter Tennant's blog on Ghostwatch and Halloween, click here
29 October 2009
I was astonished to hear a clip from Ghostwatch on Radio 4 this morning! It was on Reece Shearsmith's Haunted House discussing scary TV and radio: he is clearly a fan. Excellent! Mark Gattiss called Ghostwatch "genius" and particularly liked the name of the ghost: "Pipes". Vic Reeves had never heard of it - (also excellent!) Here's the link if you want to catch it (for the next seven days):
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00nfsjy#synopsis
Also, if you missed my appearance on "Ghosts in the Machine" on Tuesday it is repeated on Friday at 10.35 on BBC Four, or you can catch it via BBC i-player.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00nk9yw/Ghosts_in_the_Machine/
25 October 2009
My three favourite novellas, posted here:
http://ttapress.com/712/their-favourite-novellas/0/5/
24 October 2009
I will be appearing next Tuesday night October 27 on BBC Four at 21.00hrs on a programme called "Ghosts in the Machine" about the depiction of ghosts on television. I was interviewed alongside director Lesley Manning about Ghostwatch. It sounds interesting; though I was bemused when they asked me my opinion of Rentaghost!
22 October 2009
You can read a review by Peter Tennant of my new novella "Vardoger" in Black Static #13 (Oct/Nov 2009). Out now. The issue also contains my latest Electric Darkness piece, "That's The Way To Do It".
5 October 2009
This year, I was thrilled to be asked by the prestigious Screenwriters' Festival to give a talk about the creation and impact of my TV Halloween "hoax" Ghostwatch.
The SWF (which runs from 26-29 October and takes place at Cheltenham Ladies' College) brings together international screenwriters and the industry in which they work, to a single dedicated event. "It provides an atmosphere where writers can meet directors, producers, agents, as well as have a chance to listen and learn from the best in the business with screenings, talks and workshops."
My session on Ghostwatch is on the Wednesday, October 28, at 10.30-11.30 (subject to change). More details can be seen here:
http://www.screenwritersfestival.com/
Also, Mark Morris has just announced that "Cinema Futura", the science-fiction follow-up to the British Fantasy Award-winning "Cinema Macabre", will be published by PS Publishing in September 2010. The book, edited by Mark, will contain sixty essays by an all-new line-up of genre aficionados, each of whom will spend 1000 words or so gushing about a favourite science-fiction movie.
I'm proud to say I am one of those writers, and the film I will be gushing about will be Westworld (1973). For more details go to:
Happily, FantasyCon is looming in the wing mirror (18-20 September). I'll be there to launch and sign copies of "Vardøger" and hopefully to do a reading. I will also, I'm told, be sitting on a panel discussing the end of the world (in fiction, luckily) alongside Tim Lebbon. So if you are capable (as opposed to incapable by that stage) come along: it's at midnight on the Saturday.
I am also involved in the Arts Festival "Tell Tale Trail" in my home town of Bradford-on-Avon in Wiltshire. On Tuesday 22 Sept at 7.30 I will be talking about short story writing alongside New York Times best-selling novelist Simon R. Green and acclaimed novelist and children's author Jasper Bark. Then on Saturday 26 Sept at 6.00 we three will be joined by other local writers to read from our work. Come along! Somebody has to.
http://www.theartsfestival.co.uk/
23 August 2009
My new novella "Vardøger" is now available for pre-order from Gray Friar Press.
100 signed limited hardcovers.
300 unsigned trade paperbacks.
A chilling psychological thriller, "Vardøger" is Gray Matter Novella #5 in the series (after "Rain" by Conrad Williams, "Hard Roads" by Steve Vernon, "The Appetite" by Nicholas Royle, and "Groaning Shadows" by Paul Finch).
17 August 2009
I have a story coming out in the British Fantasy Society Yearbook 2009; the first in the BFS's new series of exclusive annual anthologies.
"Twenty writers -- from seasoned award-winners to rising stars -- offer twenty never before published tales, offering a broad sample of stories with imagination the only limit." Nearly three hundred, hard-bound pages, 100,000 words of "the best in speculative fiction" from:
JAMES BARCLAY, ALLYSON BIRD, ANDREW CARTMEL, MARK CHADBOURN, CHRISTOPHER FOWLER, GARY FRY, GARRY KILWORTH, TIM LEBBON, STEVE LOCKLEY, JULIET E. MCKENNA, GARY MCMAHON, MARK MORRIS, ADAM L. G. NEVILL, DANIEL O'MAHONY, SARAH PINBOROUGH, NICHOLAS ROYLE, ROBERT SHEARMAN, STEPHEN VOLK, KAARON WARREN and CONRAD WILLIAMS.
My story is called "After the Ape" and I'm really delighted to be in such illustrious company within those covers.
The only way to own a copy is by being a member of the British Fantasy Society: it is given free exclusively to members and will never appear for sale.
The book will hopefully be launched at FantasyCon 2009 in Nottingham (Sept 18-20), with many of the contributing authors gathered under one roof and available to sign copies of the book. (I certainly will be!).
10 August 2009
Delighted to announce I have a story I'm very proud of, called "Hounded", in the upcoming anthology "Gaslight Grotesque: Nightmare Tales of Sherlock Holmes" edited by Charles Prepolec and Jeff Campbell (Edge Publishing); due to be out in November.
See here for more details and to pre-order:Gaslight Grotesque Blogspot