The Ghost That Spooked a Nation: Stephen Volk at TEDxBradfordonAvon
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- Опубликовано: 26 сен 2024
- Stephen Volk talks about the creation and aftermath of his notorious "live" TV drama Ghostwatch, which generated an avalanche of complaints, jammed the switchboard at the BBC, and even caused questions to be raised in Parliament. Stephen Volk is a BAFTA award-winning screenwriter. His numerous credits include the ITV drama series Afterlife, Ken Russell's iconoclastic movie Gothic and the recent British supernatural mystery starring Rebecca Hall, The Awakening.
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)
This scared the shit out of me back in '92. Absolutely brilliant, I still love it to this day. It was decades ahead of its time.
Yes, that kind of call-in show was pretty common at the time so the format was totally familiar. I had doubts as things started to happen but I confess that I stared really hard at the end credits until I found "special effects" as confirmation.
I was one of the lucky ones who saw this when it was first shown.
My mom and I turned it on a few minutes after it started, so we had no idea it was a drama.
The presenters lent an extra air of realism too, because they were well known faces on TV at the time, and exactly the sort of presenters you would expect on a show like this.
I live in the States now, and I have introduced it to my American wife and kids. It's a family tradition that we watch it every Halloween.
I'm also a brit living in the US. I'd love to connect somehow and beg you for a dvd rip of it! Haha
I have such a vivid memory of that night, I was 11 years old at the time and staying with my parents at my Grandmother's house for the half term holiday. Words cannot do justice to how scared I was that night, literally quaking with fear. Came back to re-watch this Ted talk after seeing the Inside No.9 live special which was something of an homage.
dpw81 It still scares me lol. It was genius.
Scared me senseless as a 13-year-old. I couldn't sleep for several nights afterwards. Way ahead of it's time, I think hindsight should tell us what a brilliant piece of programming this was.
So nice to see the comments from people who saw it as a child when it was broadcast live. I was 12 at the time and spent that rather sleepless night over my best friend's house. Scared me and all my friends who saw it out of our wits. 12 years went by and i remembered watching whilst I was in a pub in Westbury (which is just down the road from where Stephen Volk lived as an odd coincidence) and I went online and bought a copy of the dvd and a couple of us now in our early 20's rewatched it and it still holds up with one or two exceptions. I found the acting from the kids and mum a little unconvincing but Parky, Craig Charles and Sarah & Mike do a great job. I also realised I recognised the actress who played the psychologist as she had been in a well known episode of only fools and horses (but didn't when I was 12 which was lucky as it would have shattered the deception).
All in all I miss writers who grew up watching the old 70's Christmas ghost story adaptations as they scared me (and still do) worse than any horror movie in the last 25 years
i remember watching it . programmes like that stay with you.
I saw it originally and was terrified at age 10. It was fantastic. I saw it again recently and whilst my frame of reference was different, the power of the show was clear. Superb programming.
It's especially great to see and hear this of a TED talk to which I'm a fan as I have fond memories of Halloween 92', it was one month before my 9th Birthday. It was a great night with my brother and cousins and we had all dressed up really well as a rarity. We'd been out to see my other cousins, aunty and uncle at their house to say hello and watched this when we got back again. We were dealing with a combination of the creepiness of the show and scared as to whether it was real or not and my dad and uncle scratching on the door. It felt like the program was on all night with the back n forth of the haunted house and the studio. Really great, warm memories.
I was 11 years old and saw it live. It absolutely terrified me and gave me sleepless nights for years.
I wouldn’t usually comment on things like this, but I was 8 when I watched this and it was before the watershed and this guy doesn’t know how much he affected people at the time. He may laugh, but I couldn’t sleep for years without the lights on and was terrified because of this.
It was post watershed, around 9:30pm. It was billed as a drama and came with a warning. Begs the question why so many parents let their young children stay up to watch it. It was good television, but I understand why it would have scared an 8 year old, but to be fair you weren't the target audience. It was the hysterical reaction of grown men and women which scared me more than the programme itself.
Well ur parents shouldn't of let u watch it, it was a horror for adults. No this mans fault 😂
I didn't stop staring at the corner of my bedroom for 5 years. Used to sleep with the light on.
Me too...
watched this when I was 12! sneaked into the living room and was found out when I screamed I didn't sleep for a week!!!
This is like the 1938 radio play of WAR OF THE WORLDS in the US, which had all sorts of side effects. Scared people out of their minds.
The freak out of war of the worlds was a hoax
The fact that someone WANTED it to be like WOTW is incredible. (See ~40 seconds into this video.) Did you ever listen to the RadioLab episode about the WOTW broadcast? It caused pandemonium. I''m sure the person didn't want anyone to die or the like, but still, you're playing with fire!
Thankyou Stephen for such a brilliant programme. It was a smash hit with the kids at the school where I taught. I always approve of anyone making a move against 'orrible 'alloween, but what does concern me is the great British fear of scaring people, when we are given so much rubbish to watch otherwise. We as a nation must learn to think, & this really challenged them. Have always appreciated Sarah Greene. Do you remember a David Weeks & his stone tapes? Will def. try to get hold of the anniversary DVD of G.W.
Loved Ghostwatch. I saw Michael Parkingson talking about his first 'acting role' a few days before, so he gave away that it was fake. Watched with a group of friends and I was the only one who knew it wasn't real! Everyone else was totally fooled and taken in. I played along trying my best not to laugh as my friends nearly cr*pped themselves.
Watching this makes me think how similar Rec/quarantine was in terms of the same set up and execution. All relaxed at the beginning then the tension builds up for the climax.
amazing programme!!!
American here, only just discovered the original, messaged a friend in Manchester. Said she was scared out of her wits.
So there are 3 people who will be 25 years old this Halloween born because of ghost watch
Misplaced Kiwi michael Myers children ?
Saw a little documentary about this a while back, I really think it was totally brilliant and very far ahead of its time. Too bad the country wasn't ready for it in the least! Someone had to be the first to do this on television, and sadly someone had to take the fall for it from the public too. How much things have changed in just two decades.
It was so raw that it was convincing. Sure there was parts where the acting was a bit over the top, but in 1992 this would’ve been like a solid documentary.
Being that time of year , RUclips’s algorithms have made this arrive on my homepage. I watched it the day after transmission on VHS. It was a windy Sunday afternoon. Howling wind. Ive never been glued to the spot with dread as I was that afternoon. Years later, wanting to watch it again I had to purchase someone else’s recording off eBay. Not the best quality at all but I had it! Thank goodness the BFI released a superb DVD crammed with features and one of the best DVD menus ever made. Ghostwatch “Behind The Curtains” is an essential part of the entire viewing experience now. It’s the documentary featured at the start of this video. The Blu-ray release of Ghostwatch is due out this month too.
It certainly captured lightning in a bottle. I remember it. It was crazy on the night. I also remember Sarah Greene appearing in Children’s BBC the next week night with Andy Peters and how they kept pushing the Point that is was a drama.
Recently watched Ghostwatch because a podcast I liked discussed the aftermath of it. Honestly, if I went in blind, no podcast, no Google search that all the actors were alright, I'd be even more scared than I am now
Was the most amazing thing ever shown in my opinion, so much so nothing scares me now
even my son, brought up with ghost adventures and most haunted, was enthralled by it when he saw it. he asked if I could find it to see what the fuss was about. he sat glued while i spent more time (I was 17 when it first aired) going "Nan had a kettle like that! I had that!)
I have the dvd 📀 in drawer. I’m going to watch it tomorrow with a bottle of red wine 🍷 candles 🕯 on and phone off. May god have mercy on my soul
The major .....u should upload it 👍😃
I second that. Rip that dvd!
@@ElisabethMount I will liz
@@piranhaowner1967 good idea
I was in primary 7 when this was first shown and it was the talk of the school the next day. It scared us silly, we loved it! I remember me and my sister watching it in the dark and screaming when the figure appeared...!
I remember it well. My father and I went to visit an aunt that day in Lowestoft, we sat down and watched it through...my aunt, who was in her eighties at the time, went to bed halfway through, and as far as I know, had a decent night's kip!! We stayed up and watched the rest; I had overlooked the indications that it was introduced as a drama at the beginning, so didn't know what to think for most of the time! It was certainly gripping though...I'm glad, in s way, that I was away from home when I caught it..
It was absolutely brill!
Remember watching it well i was in my teens it was scary but not as scary as me now being 50!!!
Ghostwatch was great, I have fond memories of watching it as a kid.
Remember it well. Very well done. Had me fooled. It was scary.
Didn't help that our heating at the time made a banging noise like Mr Pipes made in the show - shat myself all night (even though we all clocked the writing credit at the end) it was f**king horrible but what a show! Agree with the comments below about it being ahead of it's time (think Blair Witch, etc). Bravo to all involved!!
Now I see the roots of The Blair Witch Project! Awesome!
I loved it. I watched it with the light off to begin with but it was so creepy I put it on. I knew it was a drama, how could people not know? I have it on DVD and have watched it a couple of times since.
Scared the crap out of my family in '92
How did your family react to the programme?. I was not born when it was aired but I did see it for the first time when I was young. I was distressed by it when I first saw it but was then told it was not real. Which then calmed me down.
I couldn’t look at curtains for months afterwards
My family watched it together, I was 10 at the time. I think we thought it was for real, only during the final scenes did we realise it was a fake. I couldn't sleep that night and it bothered me for a while afterwards too.
I was 10 and watched it live. It scared me (when the girl spoke possessed) but not to such a crazy extent publicised afterwards.
Terrified me. Will never forget it.
very interesting to hear about this great show from behind the scenes. it was so influencial to me, it terrified me even though i knew it was a drama.
ghost watch was brilliant !
I remember my older brother at the time saying it was fake due to the bad acting of one of the girl characters! They basically just ripped off the Enfield Poltergeist case.
That was mentioned to be one of the largest inspirations for it.
Yeah, it was clear they were acting. I'm surprised more people didn't realise that at the time.
The pregnant ladies chose to watch something scary and then they complained that they were shocked into labor? There was no secret that it was something scary, whether it was 'real' or a drama.
Plus there's no evidence they did go into labour BECAUSE of the their reaction to the show.
It always ticks me off when people bring up craig charles and never bring up robot wars, its a good show its like battlebots, go watch it
It's the only thing I know him from really. Never watched red dwarf until my 20's so when i saw it for the first time I thought, "hey! It's the robot wars presenter!"
Why wasn't the 18 year old who killed themself mentioned?
Remember watching this on Halloween 92....dr terrors vault of horror afterwards introducing old school horror movies with my 1st girlfriend at 14 years old.
This special was awesome even by modern standards and goes to show that even though people won't jump to the conclusion that a ghost is behind things around their house, when a news crew (who gives writing credits and known comedic actors) is shown on TV to present something, it becomes all the more believable. I think this should've actually been a wake-up call that people need to pay more attention to what they're watching and to not put too much stock in anything just because it's on television! This actually felt just as chilling as The Blair Witch Project for me!
I'm literally the same age as Ghostwatch so I was too young to watch it or get scared by it but at the same time as a super horror fan I feel a great kinship with it.
Watched this whole thing, I have no idea what they are talking about...I kept waiting for film clippings...?
I was 10 years old and terrified. I bought this on dvd to show my kids but they laughed and weren't bothered lol millennials for ya!
I watched it at the time. I was about 22 I think. I thought it was well made and pretty creepy. The repeated billing of it as a drama aside, it was obvious to anyone with half a brain that it was fiction. The reaction to it was scarier than the programme itself IMO. People can be incredibly gullible, weak and easy to manipulate even by accident. It's the same today, and to be frank that scares me more than anything to do with the supernatural. I think sometimes people react in the way they do for attention more than anything else. It's based on a need to be heard, due to deeply ingrained insecurity and a need to appear virtuous. For others who genuinely believed what they were seeing, I don't know how they get through the day to be honest.
Good for you. Some people didn't see the start, and others were kids who didn't understand. Either way it was brilliant TV.
@@grahamlees6152 It was brilliant TV, I agree, but why were children watching a post watershed presentation that came with a warning that some may find it disturbing? Secondly even if folk missed the introduction, the fact that the credits said it was 'Written by...' and was 'Starring...' was something of a give away. Besides that, if grown men and women really thought what was happening was real, that's a personal failing on their part, not that of the BBC (who I rarely defend)
@@WarrenCromartie2 on the show, parkinson made that very point during one of the fake phone-ins.
I don’t believe in ghosts...but they still scare the dickens out of me!
I don't either but the prospect of coming face to face with one is frightening to think about
Surrounded by spirits im always watching spirits haunting people look. Behind you hes touching you .
Round and round the garden like a teddy bear
Demonstrates the stupidity of a nation that couldn't see it was fake. I was about 13 and could tell by the child 'acting.
Hitchcock would have been proud, if they were making it today, they would probably say, yep, we could probably do it for three million quid ? oh how things have changed. and yes, i saw the original airing
what's this mic quality
as a non-Brit who saw it way after it first showed, i had no idea the actors were actual News Personalities. i thought it was all totally disconnected from any _actual_ journalism, so yeah, i get it - i'd probably have been pissed too. it'd be like Bill O'Reilly doing a program presented as news, then putting on an act of ridiculous, dramatized fakery with zero factual honesty or even explanation.
okay, maybe Bill O'Reilly was not such a good choice, but you know what i mean - it _was_ kind of shady, handling the peoples' trust like that. public trust SHOULD be a sacred thing - a rare, wonderful gift not to be abused for light entertainment. that's what _i_ think, anyway.
He waxes lyrical about his achievement, yet pays scant regard for that which influenced him. He speaks of his 'legacy' and takes credit for paranormal based TV series and films that followed, yet ignores that which preceded him. I speak, of course, of the Enfield Poltergeist; which predates his experiment by 15 years. Much of the ghostwatch programme was just a reworking of the events that happened in 1977.
Correct
He waxes lyrical.... good grief your pretention is giving me heart burn
sir, I'm Chandan from India my family are in dangerous condition so please sir help me
the Ghost is disturbing my family
what can I do sir
i think I'm going to become mad to hear about it
I know that you are a researcher of ghost so sir I need your help please contact me, sir,
I'm from Bodhgaya, Gaya, Bihar, India
Why does the number of women going into labor go up with each new video?
Am I the only one that thinks viewers who believed the show was true were gullibe?
No, you're not alone. They were gullible, and those who felt 'betrayed' by the BBC were completely pathetic, and needed to grow a thicker skin.
Oddly enough, I think that a lot of the distrust in the BBC stems from this kind of disingenuous programming.
War of the worlds was a myth the reported reaction never happened, ghost watch was legitimate
He seems like a terrible persons.
Disingenuous programmes should never be celebrated, there's not enough hours in the day to watch what's real, why do things like this when there are things we really don't understand and could be investigated scientifically. Pathetic.
Oh calm down. It's entertainment
Smoke a fart
Imagine a society with no music, no art, no drama, no stories for a minute. It's impossible, because those things are the building blocks of human psychology and therefore civilisation. Stop acting so high and mighty when really you're just floating on the surface of the ocean with no clue what's underneath you. Also, stop liking your own comments, that's *really* pathetic.
It really wasn't disingenuous. It started with a disclaimer that it's fictional and ended with writing credits. Any gullibility after that point is solely on the audience. Tv isn't a place you should go for genuine truth as 99.9% of it is fake. I'd be interested in hearing your idea of a genuine tv show.... and pls don't say the news....
That's...uh...I'm not sure what that is. Unhinged? Deranged? I know it's a cliche, but I bet you're a blast at parties.
Wow what a professor I'm being sarcastic by the way
It scared the living poo poo out of me when I was a kid, and that's why I loved it. Got it on DVD now and dig it out every Halloween.
sir, I'm Chandan from India my family are in dangerous condition so please sir help me
the Ghost is disturbing my family
what can I do sir
i think I'm going to become mad to hear about it
I know that you are a researcher of ghost so sir I need your help please contact me, sir,
I'm from Bodhgaya, Gaya, Bihar, India
All those 30 000 people that complained, were the pioneers of todays snowflake generation
Can you blame them? Originally, if you were to call Ghostwatch whilst it was airing to submit a ghost story, you’d get a prerecorded message telling you that everything in the show was fictional.
But due to the thousands of people calling the same number, the network broke and the prerecorded message refused to work. This, and the fact that nobody could use the Internet to check if the show was fictional or not (due to it being the early 90s), made everyone believe that the live show was genuinely real. I feel like you’re trying to make a political statement out of something that isn’t political at all.
What's the red splodge Parky is talking about!? 😀
Pipes
@@stevenhibbert5565 I don't remember seeing that
When the camera explodes at the end
God entered into my body, as a body. my same size. holy ghost baptism. god attacks me, rips my face, shoots in mouth gum disease, appears, laughs....