HAPPY NEW YEAR!
In this festive episode of The Retro Podcast Massacre, Val takes you back to Edinburgh. A medieval city, where past links to the present.
We focus on two tales from famed Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson - Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and The Body Snatcher.
Val's old friend Dougal stops by for a dram or two, and to share with us the real-life inspiration for both stories. The dastardly Deacon Brodie, who lived by night as "Sir Lluyd" - a criminal who inspired Mr. Hyde, and then the murders of the original body snatchers, Burke and Hare.
Join us for this atmosphere soaked episode! Share a whisky with us and toast in the New Year!
Sláinte, Willing Participants.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
In this festive episode of The Retro Podcast Massacre, Val takes you back to Edinburgh. A medieval city, where past links to the present.
We focus on two tales from famed Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson - Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and The Body Snatcher.
Val's old friend Dougal stops by for a dram or two, and to share with us the real-life inspiration for both stories. The dastardly Deacon Brodie, who lived by night as "Sir Lluyd" - a criminal who inspired Mr. Hyde, and then the murders of the original body snatchers, Burke and Hare.
Join us for this atmosphere soaked episode! Share a whisky with us and toast in the New Year!
Sláinte, Willing Participants.
Ah, Willing Participant, come in, come in, from out of the cold.
Pull up a chair next to our roaring fire, and pour yourself a glass of something warming.
You find me tonight in post-Christmas mood. And to be sure, this is my favourite part of the holiday season. The pressure is off. The shopping is over. The presents are unwrapped. And I no longer need to pretend to be DELIGHTED by a pair of gloves and new knickers.
Best of all, Christmas dinner is over, the relatives are gone and we are now at the stage of eating leftovers, and rummaging through the boxes of After Eights in the hope that it’s not full of empty wrappers.
If this were the Perry Como Christmas special, this is the part of the show where he’d untie his dickie, and sing something sentimental like, “O Christmas Tree” or “The Christmas Song”. Fortunately for you, I cannot sing and I have no dickie.
And anyway, I have decided that this is not a Christmas Special. Instead it shall be a Hogmanay special, allowing you and I anticipate the New Year, as we watch at the flames dancing in the fire, through the swirling liquid of our glasses.
But as well as looking forward, New Year is also a time of reflection. Not on this past year because it was a big pile of faeces.
Instead, let me take you back further. To a place I know well, a city I love, haunted by the ghosts of memory.
…And ghosts… of the more traditional kind
Do you hear the pipes, my friend? Do you feel the cobblestones beneath your feet? Feel the thin, cool rain in the air?
Come back with me, to the City of Edinburgh, as we welcome in the New Year and bury our past.
[BAGPIPES]
My Dear Willing Participants,
I have an especial fondness for the City of Edinburgh. I lived here for 23 years up to 2017, and think of it still as home.
It is an exciting, modern city. Full of culture, bars, restaurants, cinemas and students. With a diverse population and a progressive, liberal view.
But it is also a city which cannot be divorced from its past, which sits above you – every way you may turn. From the Athenian columns of Edinburgh’s Folly, to the neat Georgian townhouses of New Town. If you turn your back to the busy promenade of shops of Edinburgh’s Princes Street, you’ll be confronted by the 12th century fortress of Edinburgh Castle – and the looming, antediluvian presence of an extinct volcano named Arthur’s Seat, named for the ancient King.
My point is this, wherever you are in Edinburgh, the decades are always in danger of slipping away. Especially on nights like this. Walking the streets after dark, as the mist the locals refer to as “the haar” gathers around the streets, it's not hard to fancy yourself in an earlier time.
Imagine the sound of traffic replaced with the sound of horse’s hooves on the streets. And as you venture down the alleyways known as “closes” or “wynds”, and hear the sound of music coming from out of the bars, songs that have been unchanged for centuries, it doesn’t take much of a romantic soul to place yourself back in those times. In the midst of those stories.
For Edinburgh is a city of stories… and of storytellers. One of the most famed being Robert Louis Stevenson who gave us such grand tales as “Treasure Island”, “Kidnapped” and “The Master of Ballantrae”.
But of more interest to you, Willing Participants may be two of his more macabre tales. Both inspired by the city of Edinburgh. One of which was directly inspired by the actual layout of the city itself.
For if you look at a map of Edinburgh, you’ll see it is broken into two distinct parts. The New Town – as it is known – is approximately 300 years old. The streets are well-ordered and the Georgian townhouses, pretty and neatly lined in rows. Fine, upstanding folk live in them. Yes, including me. Shut up.
But the old town… well, how old is it? There is evidence of human settlement dating back to 8000 bce. The heart of the Old Town is what is called The Royal Mile, a long ascending cobbled road that leads from the Palace of Holyrood at one end, up to Edinburgh Castle at the other. These days it is crowded with tourists and full of shops that sell whisky and haggis and shortbread in tartan tins.
But if you were to step off The Royal Mile, you might just find yourself squeezing down one of those wynds, or descending a steep, dark set of steps to the dark underbelly of Edinburgh. To streets with names like Cowgate and Fleshmarket Close. Down narrow, dank streets where raucous laughter emanates from seedy little pubs and where the poor denizens of old Edinburgh lurked while their privileged masters lived in the luxury of New Town, venturing into the labyrinthine streets of the Old, only to visit the bars, the gambling dens and the brothels, seeking forbidden pleasures.
Robert Louis Stevenson looked at these two sides of the city, and it struck him as the perfect metaphor for the duality and hypocrisy that dwelt at the heart of Victorian society. And it caused him to write a short novel so terrifying, that his wife read it and immediately cast it into the fire. As if in doing so, she could burn Robert’s evil ideas from existence!
Of course, you can’t keep an idea like that from escaping. Stevenson re-wrote his tale – one of the most notorious tales of horror in modern literature. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde!
Stevenson’s short novel has been adapted for the cinema more times than I can count. But some of the most significant adaptations are the 1920 silent version, starring John Barrymore, the 1931 version, starring Frederick March and the 1941 version starring Spencer Tracey.
All three of these versions follow a very similar storyline – retaining some of Stevenson’s characters and events, but also introducing some tragic romance in the character of Jekyll’s fiancée, and a singer who becomes Hyde’s mistress.
In these three versions of the tale, Jekyll is an admired doctor, who is intrigued by discussions on the nature of good and evil, and develops a serum in an attempt to expunge his darker, sinister self. Only to find – to his horror – that instead it has been liberated in the form of the dastardly Mr. Hyde.
The transformation scenes in all three versions of the story will be immediately familiar to you. There’s lots of gasping, choking and ack-ing, before the actor emerges with a sinister grin and a fiendish capering gait.
And while there are slight differences in the three stories, they follow a similar path. Mr. Edward Hyde becomes obsessed with the singer and installs her in a room he rents on the bad side of town. He abuses her terribly, but keeps people from investigating with cheques signed by his so-called “employer” Dr. Henry Jekyll. When the singer goes to Dr. Jekyll to ask for his help, he swears he will send Hyde away for good – with the intention of never taking the serum again.
But Hyde is not a man to be imprisoned within the soul of the priggish doctor. He re-emerges without the need for the serum. And takes his revenge on the singer…
[1941 clip]
Now look. I have to come clean here. I know there are a lot of people who love all three of these adaptations. But I must admit, I have problems with them. The key one being that we are so familiar with the cliches, that they’ve lost their impact. There’s also such melodrama in this version of the tale, that it almost verges on parody to our modern eyes.
That said, Barrymore’s performance is electric. While make-up is employed in his transformation – mostly to give him a creepily cone-shaped skull – the bulk of it comes from his performance which is astonishing. His leering creeping Hyde IS a completely different person – in visage as well as personality – from the altruistic Jekyll.
And that brings us to a CELEBRITY ANECDOTE:
John Barrymore may be best known as Drew Barrymore’s grandfather these days, but he was a huge movie star of the early days of Hollywood.
He’s also known as a famously debauched hellraiser, drinker and womanise – much to the detriment of his health. He was once advised by his doctor to give up wine, women and song. He asked if that meant all three of those things at once. When the doctor replied that he could give them up one at a time, he replied, “Good – I’ll start with giving up song.”
His drinking frequently got him into trouble. Such as the time he decided to pee in a potted plant while onstage, in the middle of a performance in New York City. Or the time he blundered into the wrong bathroom to relieve himself, and was told by an irate woman, “You can’t do that here. This is for ladies only!”
Barrymore turned around, his lad in his hand announced, “And so, my dear lady, is this!”
He was also somewhat the worse for wear when he heard Orson Welles’ infamous radio production of “The War of the Worlds” in 1938. Drunkenly convinced that Martians had landed and were about to take over the world, he stagged out to the kennels containing his beloved dogs. Flinging the door of the kennels wide, he told the bemused dogs, “Fend for yourselves!” before staggering back into the house.
Sadly, Barrymore died shortly afterward in 1942. His final words were records as, “Die? I should say not, dear fellow. No Barrymore would allow such a conventional thing to happen to him.”
And that is the end of our celebrity anecdote.
Frederick March’s 1931 performance cannot match that of Barrymore, so more use is made of make-up effects. His Hyde, with a mouthful of snarling teeth is much more ape-like that Barrymore’s – almost as if Hyde is an evolutionary step back. March also plays Jekyll with a midwestern American accent. But I can’t fault him too much for that – accents are going to be the PLAGUE of Robert Louis Stevenson adaptations – as you’ll shortly find out.
Spencer Tracey’s Jekyll is also an apparent American. His Hyde is a wild-eyed, grinning gargoyle of a man. But still he LOOKS a lot like Jekyll. Yet another problem which will plague adaptations of this tale. Jekyll & Hyde movies suffer from Clark Kent syndrome, where someone merely removes a pair of glasses or a false nose and suddenly all the other characters go, “God GOD! It’s been YOU this whole time!!”
But Tracey’s isn’t the only awful accent in the 41 version. Ingrid Bergman is beautiful and stunning as always, as Ivy the singer. But oh dear god where in the fuck is she from? Instead of giving her a name like Agnetha or Anni-Frid and simply letting her be a Swedish immigrant, they instead force Cockney dialogue on her. Leading her to deliver lines like this:
[1941 Bergman dialogue]
Of course, this was just the start. There have been dozens of adaptations of the story starring everyone from Michael Caine to Tony Todd, from Anthony Perkins to Jack Palance. I watched as many of these as I could but really want to focus on just a few of them.
The first is the wonderfully titled Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde. Yes! In this Hammer version from 1971, the illustrious doctor takes the serum and transforms… INTO A WOMAN! WITH BOOBS!
Look, the boobs are VERY important to Hammer. In fact, the inclusion of boobs may the only reason that Hammer decided to go this way with the story. And to emphasise this point, the poster for the movie contains a VERY SERIOUS WARNING.
WARNING: The sexual transformation of a man into a woman will actually place before your VERY EYES!
I have to tell you. I don’t think it’s really a serious warning. I think it’s just their subtle way of telling the punters that there’s going to be BOOBS in the filum. Call me Mr. Cynical, if you will.
But that is not the only liberty that Hammer take with this version of the story. In the film, Dr. Jekyll, played by Ralph Bates is not attempting to divide human nature into good and evil components. He’s actually working on an elixir to prolong life, and having noticed that women live longer than men, decides to investigate this.
“What gives woman’s skin that silken texture? Why does she keep her hair, while men lose theirs? HORMONES!”
It's true, isn’t it? Women DO live longer. How very unfair. PLUS men have to take the rubbish out every week. But we don’t have to shave our fannies, so there’s that. Anyway, I digress.
Jekyll creates his elixir using hormones from women’s bodies, delivered to his door by Burke and Hare. Yes! The infamous murderers! I’ll be coming back to them later in this episode, so hold that thought.
When Jekyll uses the elixir on himself, he immediately turns into Martine Beswick. So there’s a couple of things I need to say about this. Firstly Martine is BLOODY BRILLIANT as Jekyll’s “sister”, Mrs. Hyde.
(They never reveal her first name. I’m going to assume that it’s Kylie.)
Martine is another great Hammer villainess – the equal of Ingrid Pitt in “The Vampire Lovers” or Ursula Andress in “She”. Not only does she actually bear some physical resemblance to Ralph Bates, but she’s just magnificent as the powerful, confident, smirking Sister Hyde.
Martine later revealed that she was under intense pressure throughout the shoot to show more flesh. She had agreed to go topless, but the producers wanted to show full-frontal nudity. She said it helped her performance in a way – she channelled all of her anger and frustration into the role and by god it works.
[CLIP]
However, Jekyll’s supply of female hormone dries up when Burke and Hare are captured and so Jekyll ventures out onto the streets of London, killing prostitutes and dissecting them to harvest their essence. He does this as both himself and as Sister Hyde – which allows the writers of this film to tie in the legend of Jack the Ripper as well!
Crikey! You can’t say this film doesn’t give you your money’s worth.
The fact that this version of the story eliminates the central conceit – that Jekyll is good and Hyde is his evil counterpart – means something very interesting. That JEKYLL can be the murderer in this version of the story! And Hyde as well! I mean, I guess you could say that it is Jekyll’s desire to DO good that liberates the evil in his soul, but really, I think the message of this film is that even without Hyde, Jekyll is an evil ratshit motherfucker. And once again I have nailed it with my very eloquent analysis.
Naturally, there are LGBT+ undercurrents to this movie. As I’ve said previously about Hammer movies, I do not think this was on purpose. Hammer were an exploitation studio and literally all they cared about was squeezing as many boobs and bums onto the screen as possible. Not that this isn’t a laudable aim, but any LGBT+ subtext is likely unintentional. Nevertheless, I hope LGBT+ viewers love Martine as much as I do. She’s a complete contrast to the standard woman in Hammer films. She’s strong, funny, openly sexual, powerful and predatory.
However, the story – which falls into the old trope of showing a character of ambiguous gender as a homicidal maniac – could of course be interpreted as transphobic, in much the same tradition as Psycho or Silence of the Lambs. Whether that is intentional or not, it is still important to acknowledge. However I hope it will not stop trans viewers from enjoying this film – and maybe finding value in it – as a movie which explores the story of a person who is quite literally “gender-fluid”.
It would be a shame if 1970’s attitudes were to prevent you from enjoying this film. It looks great and it is heaps of atmospheric fun. It was directed with verve and panache by Roy Ward Baker, who also gave us “Scars of Dracula”, “The Vampire Lovers” and “Quatermass and The Pit”.
But the ingenious thing is the plot change. In dispensing with all that good vs evil claptrap, Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde, is able to leap right into the action. It’s fast, atmospheric, gory Hammer fun. It gets right into the action within minutes, and drenches you in the seamy underbelly of Victorian society, taking you into smelly pubs and meeting ladies who say things like “Allo dearie! Does the gentleman fancy a quickie?” Before leading you down dark alleys where sinister men in top hats and capes turn to face you… their hands dripping with blood…
I loved it. It’s a four out of five from me.
Actually, Hammer had a previous crack at this story in 1960, with the much more prosaic “The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll”.
Again, serious liberties are taken with this version of the story – in which actor Paul Massie plays Jekyll and Hyde. His Jekyll is married to a philandering wife, Kitty who is indulging in a spot of how’s yer father with Jekyll’s best friend – played by Christopher Lee.
So this film is more of a revenge tale than anything else, as Paul Massie’s handsome debonair Hyde does what Jekyll cannot with murderous consequences, in a plot involving bordellos and killer snakes.
I should stop. Because I’m making it sound better than it is. This is a brightly-lit, ballroom party sort of film which is no use at all in a story that needs to be set in dark alleyways. Paul Massie’s Jekyll is a huge bore, even moving around the set like he is suffering from both a bad back and a pickle up the arse at the same time.
As Mr. Hyde, he puts a bit more oomph into it, but the script to this movie has even Hyde acting with calm gentility and eloquence. Hammer seem resistant to really show Hyde’s violent nature. And as a result, this film feels less like a horror movie and more like a really weird version of “The Importance of Being Earnest”.
Also, I couldn’t help but notice that Mr. Hyde is clean-shaven, while Dr. Jekyll has a full beard. Which made me wonder what happens to the beard during transformation? Does it fall out and then re-grow? Or does it – SHOOP – go back in when Mr. Hyde appears then SHOOT OUT again when he returns to Dr. Jekyll? It bothered me, Willing Participants.
So I’m afraid “The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll” gets only a two and a half out of five from me.
I can’t help this film would have been so much better with Lee in the lead. But perhaps he was tired of playing villains. In this film he’s Jekyll’s rakish friend Paul, constantly out of money and hanging around with prostitutes. However, Lee did get to have a go at the dual role in 1971, in the Amicus film named “I, Monster”.
It's a strange adaptation – mainly because it renames Jekyll and Hyde as “Marlowe and Blake” for reasons I cannot fathom. Cushing also stars, but is not given very much to do. As for Lee – obviously I love him as an actor. But oh dear god, his transformation scene is godawful. In a scene which seems to hearken back to Barrymore’s masterful performance, Lee capers about with a cheesy grin on his face, threatening laboratory mice. He improves, as the film goes on, but this version adds very little to the story and I’m going to breeze right past it, pausing only to dispense a two out of five – mainly for the look of the thing, which is actually quite good.
But perhaps the most interesting – and frustrating – version of this tale was 1994’s big-budget, big name spectacular. The film called, “Mary Reilly”. I film I want to like SO MUCH but it just won’t let me.
That’s not it. That’s not the entirety of my review. I’ll get there. I just need to express my frustration for a moment. Do excuse me.
[FOR FUCK’S SAKE! FUCKING BOLLOCKS!!]
Okay, I’m back.
Mary Reilly – based upon a novel I have not read by Valerie Martin – attempts to tell the tale of Dr. Jekyll through the eyes of his young, inexperienced and shy housemaid, the eponymous Mary – as played by Julia Roberts.
Now – before I go any further I should emphasise that if you think Julia Roberts is famous NOW, you should have been around in the early 90’s. Back then she was Beyonce famous. She was Oprah famous. She was like Scarlett Johanssen and Charlize Theron combined with Jesus. THAT’S how famous she was.
So her taking the role of this mousey, scared little housemaid was a brave, bold and – some might say – really, REALLY bad choice. Because she can act as well as she likes, but she will still always be JULIA FUCKING ROBERTS in big neon lights with an exclamation mark at the end.
And once again, we have “accent issues”. I have no idea what Mary’s accent is supposed to be. It’s a little bit Irish, a little bit Scottish. She sounds like she is from Whatthefuckisstan.
I suppose I shouldn’t be too critical. I, for example, cannot do a proper American accent either. Every American accent I do ends up sounding like Rosco P Coltrane from “The Dukes of Hazzard”. For example here’s my Robert de Niro.
DE NIRO: You talkin’ to me? Well there ain’t anyone else here so ya must be talking to me.
And here’s my Donald Trump
TRUMP: Well ah move on them lahk a beetch, grab ‘em bah the pussy [BLEEPED]
And here’s my Julia Roberts
ROBERTS: Ah’m jest a girl standing in front of a bowah askin’ him to love her. Enus you dipstick!
Putting the accent aside, Mary has been beaten down by life in every horrific way. So she is incredibly grateful to be in the service of the kind, gentle Dr. Henry Jekyll, played by John Malkovich. It’s made clear pretty early on that Mary has a fantasy crush on her employer and it’s made equally clear that he is aware of this.
Whether he regards her adoration as anything more than bemused stroking of his ego is not clear. This IS the Victorian era after all, and the lower classes are just that – low. Still, he is intrigued by her past and some prominent scars on her body. He asks her to divulge her past to him.
[clip]
Jekyll is fascinated by the story of Mary’s father – a man whose evil nature is unleashed by alcohol who abuses his daughter by locking her away with rats when she displeases him. But in the timeline of this tale, Jekyll’s experiments have already begun.
His Hyde is already on the loose.
Perhaps inspired by her tales of evil, Mr. Hyde goes on to even greater acts of wickedness in the evening. Mary is sent on a secret errand to give money to a brothel-keeper – wonderfully played by Glenn Close – and is shown to a room drenched in the blood of a prostitute, and containing a dead rat.
Now then – is the fact that Hyde employs a rat for some devilish use, a poke at US, Willing Participants? That we also devour tales of horror to fuel our own sordid imaginings? I should hope not. We are, after all, very upstanding persons, I am sure you will agree.
Mary’s terror is contained by her love of her master. And she accepts Jekyll’s explanation that Mr. Hyde had been there performing an abortion which had gone wrong. But soon she encounters Mr. Hyde himself – and despite her morals – finds herself falling for the evil in her beloved Dr. Jekyll – as well as the good.
There’s a lot of complexity to examine here, and I think if this were a better film it would probably be about the attraction of evil. And of the terrible cycle of domestic violence where victims play out and play out the abuses of their childhood – trying to resolve issues with their parents in their current partners.
I think that is what this film is driving at.
But it’s just SO HARD to figure it out. Mainly because this film seems to miss all the targets it aims at. The key one being that Mary is supposed to love both Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. But really, there is ZERO chemistry between the two leads. None.
Malkovich’s Jekyll is circumspect and diplomatic in his speech. Hinting at his hidden secret, but never speaking of it. And this is fucking frustrating, because we – the audience – bloody well know what is going on. As Mr. Hyde, he’s a great deal more interesting, forcing her to face her own feelings – making her look at the darkness within herself. But the connection between Hyde and Mary is still never really explored because Mary herself is such a caged, buttoned-down, betrodden character.
As the shy housemaid, she never really gets to express herself. And this is exacerbated by Julia Roberts fearful, nervy performance. She whispers and shuffles, her eyes widen, but she says nothing. This is a major issue – this film needed passion! Aplomb! The feelings Stephen Frears was able to muster is his previous hit movie, “Dangerous Liaisons” in which Malkovich played a very similar character and Michelle Pfeiffer BURNED with desire for him, despite her character being similarly constrained by social norms.
Godammit Stephen Frears! Why couldn’t you have allowed Mary to loosen those corsets and turn into a bit of an animal! To let her inner Martine Beswick out! Then we would have had a movie!
Therefore, I am forced to give this film a “meh” out of five.
My frustration arises from the fact that this film could have been so much better. It’s the only film I’ve mentioned tonight to use some actual Edinburgh locations as the backdrop. And Glenn Close is fantastic in her supporting role, her red lipstick turned down into a rictus of disdain. As a random thought, it is a shame she never got to play the part of the Joker. Not purely for the sake of gender-swapping. Just that Glenn Close does cruel, vicious humour better than other actor I know. There is a bitter cold to her toothy smile that could leave you frostbitten.
I think the main problem with is that I think this film should be nastier than it is, cheaper than it is, less nuanced than it is. As an example of what I mean, I think you could compare Mary Reilly to David Cronenberg’s wonderful film, “The Fly”. In that film, another sad scientist frees the beast within himself. A beast which was always there, but which he inadvertently allows ascendancy.
Cronenberg’s film is much more interesting in depicting the struggle between the two halves of the scientist’s psyche. It also gives a more interesting and articulate voice to that film’s version of Mary Reilly. And because of that, it says the things about our darker selves that “Mary Reilly” can only ever whisper.
And that I think, covers the cinema adaptations of Stevenson’s tale. A story inspired by this great city. And now let us go to The Bow Bar on Victoria Street to sample their “Malt of the Moment”.
DOUGAL: Ah well, there was another inspiration for the tale you know. A local lad, named William Brodie.
ME: Dougal! My oldest and dearest friend! It’s good to see you again!
DOUGAL: You’ll have had yer tea?
ME: Well, of course. But what’s that about this Brodie fellow?
DOUGAL: Buy me a whisky and I’ll tell you the whole tale.
[SOUNDS OF PUB AND POURING]
William Brodie lived in 18th century Edinburgh. He was a respectable man – a pillar of the community they say – by day. He was the son of a cabinet maker, inheriting his father’s successful business and supplying the great and the good of Edinburgh with fine furniture.
He prospered, did Brodie. He lived in a fine house and strode proudly through the streets of the New Town, dressed in finery and wearing a powdered wig. As was the fashion of the time.
But by night… Brodie had a fascination with criminality and rascality. Brodie joined a gentleman’s club called “The Cape Club” where he was given his club name, “Sir Lluyd” – and he began to fashion himself a new persona – that of Sir Lluyd, who he based upon MacHeath, the chivalrous highwayman of The Beggar’s Opera.
As Sir Lluyd, Brodie took two separate mistresses and had two families – neither of which knew of each other. He frequented the iniquitous gambling pits, bare-knuckle bouts and cockfights taking place in the Cowgate, where the poor Irish immigrants crowded, and drunkenness and debauchery existed alongside terrible poverty.
But as dawn came, Brodie was always back in his fine house, with his fine friends none the wiser.
But men like Brodie love to play with fire. Accumulating gambling debts, Brodie began to use his skills as a cabinet-maker to undertake burglaries all around the city. He’d take wax impressions of keys when he was installing new locks into the doors of Edinburgh’s wealthy, returning to take their precious possessions later.
He worked with a small team of three other low, criminal men. But things went badly wrong when the four tried to rob the excise house. A clerk, returning unexpectedly to his office, blundered into the crew and Brodie – like the timorous coward he was – ran away to save his own skin.
But his accomplices turned upon Brodie – and though he tried to escape to America – he was found cowering in a cupboard in Amsterdam and returned to the authorities in Edinburgh. Still, Brodie remained defiant and cocky, even after being condemned to death by hanging.
For rumour has it that Brodie used his skills one last time, to fashion a metal collar for himself, which would render the hangman’s noose useless. And that he bribed the hangman to have his body whisked away before anyone could discover the deception. There are those who say he failed, and that he died that day, hanged from a gallows which he himself had helped to design.
But there are others who swear that they saw and heard Brodie, still wearing that powdered wig, striding through the streets of Paris, long after having his neck stretched by the rope.
And maybe Robert Louis Stevenson was one of those folk who heard this tale. And looked upon the cabinet made for his own father, by none other than Brodie himself – and thought to himself, “Aye, there’s a tale there.”
ME: Good lord, Dougal! Is all that TRUE?
DOUGAL: Well it’s what I tell the tourists. So, close enough. But Stevenson had more than one tale of Edinburgh in him. There was also the tale of The Body Snatcher, inspired by the diabolical trade in bodies that took place in this very city.
ME: Heavens! Tell me more!
DOUGAL: Well… I would… but my throat’s a bit parched, you know…
ME: Another whisky.
DOUGAL: Better make it a double, it’s a long story.
[POURING NOISES]
DOUGAL: Well, Edinburgh has always been a centre of pioneering medical research. And in the early part of the nineteenth century, medical students were eager to see the anatomist at work – in order to further their studies.
But of course, it wasn’t just that.
For you see, back in those days denying a man a Christian burial – and furthermore subjecting his lifeless corpse to the INDIGNITY of public dissections – for all the world to see! – was considered a CRUEL punishment indeed! And so, in 1752, the parliament in Westminster passed the Murder Act, to deter potential murderers from committing their FOUL crimes, lest they find themselves on the anatomist’s table!
ME: Good heavens! And did it work?
DOUGAL: Of course it fucking didn’t. Stupid fucking question.
ME: Sorry.
DOUGAL: And so the work of the medical researchers continued, but still there were not enough bodies for them to examine. And so the EVIL TRADE of the resurrectionist men began. These were the grave robbers who dug up the graves of the recently departed and delivered the poor souls to Edinburgh’s doctors.
The doctors – finding themselves in possession of bodies – still with the stench of the grave upon them – asked no questions as to where these bodies came from. And so Edinburgh’s shameful trade in bodies began.
Now William Burke and William Hare are perhaps Edinburgh’s most famous ghouls. The irony being that neither man ever robbed a grave in his life! No t’was not for them, to stand at midnight in the cemetery – defiling the rest of the dead. They were a pair of hard-living, hard-drinking Irishmen who realised how profitable it could be to sell the dead to the living when an elderly gentleman living in the guest house of Hare’s mistress died suddenly – leaving behind him naught but debts to the lady.
To cover the costs of his room, Burke and Hare took the corpse of the old man to a medical man they knew named Dr. Monro – but while they were trying to find him they were instead directed to Dr. Robert Knox, who purchased the body from them. And he let them know, if they were to come across any more good specimens, he would pay a pretty price for them. Ten pounds for a good, fresh body.
And from there, Burke and Hare’s lust for gold – and for the drink it could buy them, took over their very souls. Knowing that they were unlikely to be lucky again, and have someone drop dead at their convenience, they decided to “help” some of their acquaintances along the way. The pair worked together with Burke lying across the victim to prevent movement, while the other suffocated them by covering their nose and mouth.
Working together this way, they killed at least 16 people – though many more may have perished at their hands – and all went to Dr. Knox. How much he knew of their methods, no-one can say for sure. But one thing we do know – when one of their victims was recognised on the slab – a slow-witted fellow named “Daft Jamie” – Knox made sure his head was removed before anyone else recognised the poor chap.
The pair were finally caught when a couple named Ann and James Gray stayed at the same boarding house as Burke and Hare. The murderers’ vile work was inhibited by the Grays, so they paid them to stay elsewhere that night. The Grays, already made suspicious by the behaviour of the men, came back to investigate the next day – only to find the dead body of a woman named Margaret Docherty hidden under a pile of straw.
When the Grays went to raise the police, the men panicked and hastily got rid of the body in their usual fashion. But the police raided the dissecting-rooms of Dr. Knox before he had any chance to do his unholy work, and discovered poor Margaret Docherty there.
Burke and Hare were arrested for the crimes. But which of the pair was truly guilty? The Lord Advocate decided to offer William Hare immunity from prosecution if he were to offer up a full confession. And so the whole terrible story came out.
On a cold day in 28th of January 1829, William Burke was hanged by the neck until he was dead, in Edinburgh’s Grassmarket, in the shadow of the castle.
From there, he was taken for public dissection by the same Dr. Monro he’d sought so many months earlier. Monro wrote part of his report in blood, dripping from the dissected body of William Burke. Burke’s skin was taken to make some minor, macabre keepsakes – the cover for a pocket-book and a wallet. His skeleton is on display still, at Edinburgh’s Royal College of Surgeons.
As for the other participants in the crimes – no-one really knows what happened to Hare. He narrowly escaped an angry mob on his way out of Scotland, and after he arrived in England he simply disappeared. Dr. Knox attempted to stay in Edinburgh, but his reputation was ruined by his association with Burke and Hare. Finally, he too left for London. As his coach clattered out of the capital, he was taunted by a rhyme the children sang on the streets of the Cowgate –
Up the close and doon the stair,
But and ben' wi' Burke and Hare.
Burke's the butcher, Hare's the thief,
Knox the boy that buys the beef.
And that was the tale that inspired Robert Louis Stevenson to pen “The Body Snatcher” in 1884. It’s not about Burke and Hare, of course – though it refers to them. But it brings to mind those grim times of the shovel… and the scalpel.
ME: Oooh Dougal. You’ve fair put the wind up me, so you have.
DOUGAL: Well maybe so. Or maybe it’s those pickled eggs you’ve been eating. And with that I’ll take my leave of you.
There have not been quite so many films inspired by the story of Burke and Hare. And those that we have are a pretty mixed bag. “The Flesh and The Fiends” from 1960 stars Peter Cushing as Dr. Knox. It’s an extremely accurate portrayal – Cushing with one drooping eyelid, to simulate Knox’s real-life disfigurement through smallpox.
The other good news is that the film also stars a young Donald Pleasance as the weaselly Hare, and the fantastic Billie Whitelaw as a local prostitute. But I have to admit, I found the film to be a very dry re-telling of the tale. It was not made by Hammer and lacks that studio’s verve and atmosphere, so I’ll give it just a two and a half out of five.
However, one of Hammer’s best directors, Freddie Francis would also get a chance at the tale in 1985 with “The Doctor and The Devils”. And I was so excited by this version. It features fabulous sets and it looks just great. The atmosphere is thick and heavy. You can almost SMELL the urchins. And the acting talent is amazing! The film features Jonathan Pryce and Stephen Rea as the murderers, Timothy Dalton as the doctor and co-starring Twiggy, Beryl Reid and Patrick Stewart. PLUS it is based on an unproduced script by none other than Dylan Thomas. It’s bound to be fantastic, right?
I’m sorry. You’re going to have to excuse me for another moment.
[OH FOR FUCK’S FUCKING SAKE!! WHY? WHY?!???]
It’s awful. It’s just awful. Again, the accents are a big part of the problem. Given that Stephen Rea is an actual Irish person, I have no fucking idea what accent he was doing. At least it was the same one as Jonathan Pryce. But honestly, I had a very hard time following what either of them were saying. And bear in mind I was raised in England by an Irish parent and have spent most of my life in Scotland.
And the film feels like a long, slow, plodding drawn-out telling of the events. The atmosphere and the acting talent couldn’t save it, I was so bored by this version of the tale. Which is why it is just a one out of five – purely for the look of the thing.
I have to give “Horror Maniacs” from 1948 three out of five, with at least one point there going to the title. It stars legendary British horror performer Tod Slaughter as one of the murderers. If you don’t know about Slaughter, he was an actor mainly known for his stage work, although he made a series of horror films as well.
He typically played way-over-the-top capering, chuckling, sneering villainous roles. Sadly, he never gets to go full Dick Dastardly in this film – still the film is short and he’s amusing enough in the role for me to find this the most entertaining of the adaptations so far.
Now I was unable to track down the film Burke and Hare from 1972 – and I simply couldn’t be bothered with the 2010 comedy version starring Andy Serkis and Simon Pegg. But fortunately we also have the film, “The Body Snatcher” directed by Robert Wise for horror maestro Val Lewton in 1945. Now THIS is more like it!
Based on the short story from Robert Louis Stevenson, which he published in 1884 – some 56 years after the Burke and Hare killings – The Body Snatcher is not about Burke and Hare as such. In fact, they are referred to in the film. Instead, this tale is set amongst the resurrectionists – those men who would dig up recently dead bodies for sale to the surgeons.
In Robert Wise’s superbly atmospheric interpretation of the story, an altruistic young doctor named Donald Fettes becomes embroiled in the world of the grave robbers when he meets young mother and her daughter who is paralysed from the waist down.
Now – before I go any further – I should emphasise that – once again – we have a Scottish doctor here in Fettes, who goes around wearing a tartan scarf and a tam o’ shanter for most of the movie – who appears to have come from Oklahoma. Not that I mind – look it’s just how it goes. But it does lead to dialogue like this:
[CLIP]
Fettes prevails upon his mentor, the eminent Dr. MacFarlane, to perform ground-breaking surgery on the child to restore her ability to walk. But in order to do so, MacFarlane needs specimens upon which to study the spinal cord. Fettes cannot understand MacFarlane’s extreme reluctance but it soon becomes apparent that it is due to MacFarlane’s sinister “supplier”.
[CLIP]
Yes, the man bringing the bodies for MacFarlane is none other than Boris Karloff in superbly sinister mode. I mean, Karloff is always fantastic in every movie, but I especially love him in this movie. He plays Gray, a jovial, chuckling man. A coach driver by trade – but who always seems to be able to find the most fresh, the most recent, the most warm…. Bodies.
In a splendid bit of role-reversal, Gray has managed to make MacFarlane complicit in his grisly work and now openly blackmails MacFarlane – not for money or favours you understand… but to share in his company, to gloat over his work. Gray’s insistence that he spend time with his old friend, discussing the horrors he has perpetrated is driving MacFarlane mad – and Gray enjoys that part, too.
[CLIP]
Hence why MacFarlane is desperate to keep the young Fettes away from Gray too – and why he is so unwilling to help the young girl. But Fettes refuses to let the matter drop, and gets drawn deeper and deeper into Gray’s criminal enterprise.
Because this is a Val Lewton/Robert Wise film, “The Body Snatcher” looks just fantastic. And more than any other version of the tale, it really does attempt to incorporate the Edinburgh setting into the tale. Scottish folk songs play a significant – and sinister – part in the story. And perhaps because this is based upon a work of fiction – liberated from the facts – this tale has a much more satisfying narrative drive. An inevitability that pushes the players forward toward their terrible fate. And an absolutely shattering ending that hints at possible supernatural influence… of revenge being sought from beyond the grave.
Not only that, but the film features a co-starring role from Bela Lugosi as MacFarlane’s manservant! He’s not in the film very much but he does get to share an absolutely compelling scene with Karloff. As a horror fan, it made my heart happy to see these icons together again – in a really quality film that allows them to act.
You may have gathered that I really enjoyed “The Body Snatcher” and would recommend it to anyone. The accents I can overlook, what makes this film work is a love of lore of Edinburgh. The city is lovingly evoked. It’s forbidding kirkyards. The dark underbelly of the city, overhung with bridges. The shadow of the ancient castle, overlooking the lives – and deaths – of the city’s current residents. I love the sinister, yet romantic atmosphere of this tale.
And for this reason, it’s a five out of five from me for “The Body Snatcher”.
And with that I should thank you once again for indulging me with your company, my dear Willing Participants. And I’m aware that this was a very self-indulgent episode. It allowed me to travel back, in my mind to a place I know and to people I love.
As our fire turns to embers, and our glasses run low, I do hope that you too, can go to those places in your mind which are dear to you, and to the friends and family from whom you have been separated in this, most cruel year.
I should also like to send my fondest regards to all my Twitter friends include Nye, Richard, Philip, the At The Flicks team and Emma at the Movies.
I should like to offer thanks to my dear friend, Auslaender, for his contribution to this episode. To him, and to the Princess and to Mad Dog – I know for certain that I will see you again someday.
And to you, Dear Willing Participants, thank you for listening to my very silly show this year. I shall return in 2021, with more stories of death, murder, dismemberment and other fun things.
Next year, I hope to record episodes on legendary showman William Castle, the godfather of the zombies, George Romero and an in-depth look at the studio that dripped blood – Amicus. I’ll also be doing a minisode on the film “Halloween III: Season of the Witch” at the request of a pair of young upstarts named Justin and Katie. If you have any request, please do send them to me @PodcastMassacre on Twitter. I really do love hearing from you all.
But until then, as we await the chimes of midnight and the flurry of fireworks, I wish you a healing 2021, a happy return to your loved ones and a wonderful new year to you all.
Good night.
This episode of The Retro Podcast Massacre was recorded in Paraparaumu, New Zealand. Your host tonight was Val Thomas, with a special appearance from The Auslaender as Dougal.
If you enjoy this show, tell your friends. Drop a review at Apple Podcasts, or wherever you source your podcasts. And if you wish to get in touch with us, you can tweet us at Podcast Massacre or at retro podcast massacre at gmail dot com.
Thank you again for your company this year. We really appreciate it.
A very good night to you all, my dear friends. Slainte.