Kneale biography
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Thomas Nigel Kneale was born in Barrow-in-Furness on 28 April 1922.
Kneale biography
The same year saw the formation of the BBC, with which he would be closely linked throughout his early career. In 1928 Kneale moved with his parents back to their native Isle of Man, where he spent the rest of his formative years.
After briefly considering a legal career, in 1946 he moved to London to study acting at RADA. But after winning the prestigious Somerset Maugham prize for 'Tomato Cain', his 1949 collection of macabre stories, he turned to writing full-time.
Kneale's first original script was 'The Long Stairs' (tx.
1/3/1950), a radio play based on a true-life mining disaster on the Isle of Man. The following year he joined the emerging BBC Television service, initially working as an all-purpose staff writer.
Soon dissatisfied with the overly theatrical style demanded for most of his assignments, Kneale found an ideal collaborator in the ambitious wunderkind producer Rudolph Cartier, beginning a