'Quatermass Experiment' to be revived on live TV

The iconic science fiction drama The Quatermass Experimentis to be revived for a new generation with a live broadcast of an episode long lost to television history.

Nigel Kneale, the writer who created the show in 1953 and is now in his eighties, is acting as a consultant for the feature-length drama, which will be shown on BBC4 this spring.

Although the story is being brought up to date, it is essentially the script of one of the original episodes which was broadcast but not recorded. Fifties Britain was gripped by the heroics of Professor Bernard Quatermass, who launches the world's first manned rocket only to unleash a terrifying chain of events.

The recreation will be a highlight of a week of broadcasts commencing on Easter Sunday, under the heading TV on Trial, which will analyse the past six decades of British television to see whether there really was a golden age from which we have now strayed.

Janice Hadlow, controller of BBC4, said: "It's wonderful to have one of the first 'must-watch' TV experiences that inspired the water-cooler chat of its day. I hope fans of the original series, as well as a new generation, will be gripped."

It will be the first time in decades that a drama has been broadcast live.