Ghost Stories for Christmas: how TV’s most haunting locations look today

As much a Christmas tradition as Carols from King’s, A Christmas Carol and the Royal Christmas message, the BBC’s Ghost Story for Christmas has been a fixture of Yuletide TV for more than half a century. With their dread-filled atmosphere, their rich period details and gothic vistas, the many dramas made for the slot are a regular counterbalance to the lighter fare that often dominates December’s television schedules.

In spite of their wintry atmospheres, the slot didn’t actually begin with a Christmas broadcast, but instead in May 1968 with Jonathan Miller’s Whistle and I’ll Come to You, an M.R. James adaptation for BBC Omnibus. With influence from Miller’s film, director Lawrence Gordon Clark shepherded the Ghost Stories slot throughout the 1970s, with an array of mostly James adaptations along with a version of Dickens’s The Signalman (1976) and an original story, Stigma (1977). The original series ended with Derek Lister’s The Ice House (1978), though Clark also made an adaptation of James’s Casting the Runes for ITV Playhouse in 1979.

The slot returned haphazardly in the early 2000s, first with Luke Watson’s James adaptation A View from a Hill (2005), then with a smattering of other adaptations before becoming more firmly re-established thanks to the stewardship of Mark Gatiss. The Gatiss era began with a 2013 version of James’s The Tractate Middoth and has included adaptations of Arthur Conan Doyle’s ‘Lot No. 249’ and E. Nesbitt’s ‘Man-Size in Marble’. This Christmas Eve’s offering is The Room in the Tower, adapted from the story by E.F. Benson.

Particularly in the 1970s adaptations, location filming added to the atmospheric appeal. From windswept landscapes to haunted cathedrals, many a viewer’s Christmas was haunted by the evocative visuals of East Anglian plains and historic landmarks. Clark and his crew – especially when the slot was unusually produced by the BBC’s Documentary Unit – were adept at finding places to suit their haunting adaptations, resulting in some of the eeriest location filming ever seen on television.

Here are a selection of notable locations from the BBC Ghost Stories as they stand today.

Jonathan Miller’s adaptation of James’s ‘Oh, Whistle, and I’ll Come to You, My Lad’ may not technically be a Ghost Story for Christmas, due to its spring broadcast. However, its undoubted influence on the future slot guarantees it a place in any appreciation of the BBC Ghost Stories – and it set the template for many of the later series by filming in East Anglia.

Though its most terrifying sequences are filmed on the Norfolk coast around Waxham, some of the film’s most striking visuals are taken along the Suffolk coast in Dunwich. The cliffside grave, for example, is clearly meant to be around the crumbling coast of Greyfriars Priory. Miller provides a more exact shot of the location when Professor Parkins (Michael Hordern), the film’s haunted protagonist, finally reaches the beach below. The shot shows Dunwich Beach looking north as the coastline curves towards Walberswick.

When Parkins turns to look south, he finds that he is no longer alone on the beach. This shot shows the coastline heading in the other direction towards Sizewell.

Dunwich features in the story in other regards. Another little feature of the area appears in the film: this small pedestrian bridge nestled in the forest further along the coast is seen when Parkins first walks the landscape.

The hotel where Parkins stays is also in the area. Going only slightly further along the coast, Miller shot the exterior of the hotel at Cliff House.

The building is now empty and sits in the middle of a caravan site on the coastline.

In spite of appearing empty and left to the elements, many of the building’s original features survive. The most distinctive is undoubtedly the handrail leading up to the entrance of the building, which Miller uses as a framing device for this very distinctive shot.

As Parkins leaves with the Colonel (Ambrose Coghill), who is also staying at the hotel, Miller shoots them from the nearby woods.

The official Ghost Stories start with Lawrence Gordon Clark’s James adaptation The Stalls of Barchester. This deeply wintry tale follows Archdeacon Haines (Robert Hardy) facing down vengeful spirits after he saw off his predecessor Archdeacon Pulteney (Harold Bennett). Though switching between two different time periods, Clark took the Documentary Unit to film extensively in and around Norwich Cathedral, managing to convey both the Edwardian and Victorian periods effectively. The following shot shows the buildings on The Close opposite The Refectory.

Haines is seen walking past the house of the Archdeacon Pulteney many times as a running joke regarding the archdeacon’s seeming reluctance to die. The house in question is number 57 The Close, also known as Abbeyfield, opposite the cathedral.

Of course, the main location used is Norwich Cathedral itself, a perfect stand-in for the fictional Barchester. This shot, for example, opens the drama and shows the Edwardian protagonist Dr Black (Clive Swift) approaching the cathedral through the Erpingham Gate on the appropriately named road, Tombland.

The following exterior shot is taken from the west side of the cathedral parallel to The Refectory. However, the iron railings distinguishing the shot have since vanished.

Clark also makes extensive use of the interior of the cathedral, beginning with its historic cloisters.

The corridors surrounding these cloisters are also seen throughout. Haines wanders the darkened ways, but, as the drama continues, he begins to feel less alone on his meanderings.

Finally, at the end of the film, Dr Black tries to investigate the mysterious carvings that Haines mentioned throughout his diary account of his haunting. Black visits a museum in order to find out more about the cursed carving. This is now the Hungate Medieval Art centre on Elm Hill, not far from the cathedral.

Clark’s second adaptation of James is the most effective in terms of the use of locations. Concentrating on the endless horizons of the East Anglian coast, Clark achieves the strongest visual rendition of James’s atmospheres. I visited several locations from this story for an earlier feature, but one I missed was Happisburgh on the Norfolk coast. The first sighting of the location occurs when Paxton (Peter Vaughan) takes a bike ride in search of the spot where the mysterious William Ager (John Kearney) is apparently buried. Clark makes a point of filming the location’s distinctive lighthouse on Lighthouse Lane.

Clues regarding Paxton’s quest for the sacred crown of Anglia converge around Happisburgh’s Church of St Mary the Virgin. The first shot shows Paxton admiring the tower as he removes his bicycle clips.

Searching around the graveyard, Paxton examines the church more closely. The building is absolutely unchanged.

Above the church’s awning, he spots a clue: a stone effigy depicting the three crowns of Anglia. This was a prop added to the building, though the spot where it sat can still be made out.

Paxton comes across the local vicar (George Benson) who tells him the history regarding Ager. They first meet at the corner of the church’s entrance.

The vicar then shows Paxton where the grave of Ager lies. Though a little difficult to discern where the prop grave likely stood, it was undoubtedly on the north side of the graveyard, looking towards the ever-crumbling coastline.

As Paxton looks at the grave, he notices someone from afar staring at him. This is right on the path of the cliff edge.

Another part of Happisburgh seen in the film is the barn where Paxton meets the woman (Gilly Fraser) who lives in Ager’s cottage. This cottage is just outside of the village on the approach road.

However, Paxton stays much further from these locations, in Wells-next-the Sea. We first see the location when he arrives carrying his bag and shovel. It is on the town waterfront.

We see the location at various points throughout the drama. Towards the finale, we see Boots (David Cargill) sitting down to polish a pair of shoes on the first set of steps leading down to the shore.

Boots thinks he spots Dr Black (again played by Clive Swift) calling for Paxton from the other side of the dock.

Paxton then walks along the waterfront to meet the supposed Dr Black, but really he is about to meet his fate.

Though location filming continued throughout the BBC Ghost Stories, when their production shifted from the BBC’s Documentary Unit to the Drama Department, their settings became less stark. Clark’s adaptation of The Treasure of Abbot Thomas shows this contrast with a cathedral setting similar to The Stalls of Barchester. In this case, the production team chose Wells Cathedral in Somerset.

Following a treasure hunt instigated by the Reverend Somerton (Michael Bryant), the drama makes interesting use of Wells Cathedral, turning the whole building into a kind of conundrum to be solved. To achieve the feeling of progress on the journey towards the supposed alchemist’s gold, Clark makes extensive use of the cathedral’s busy designs and ornate interiors, including the building’s famed chapter house.

This part of the interior is seen early on when Somerton is meeting his pupil Lord Dattering (Paul Lavers). The architecture is exactly as it was, bar the shadows of monks that litter the space in the episode.

The cathedral’s wonderfully atmospheric library is also seen in a handful of scenes.

The treasure is pinpointed to be behind some bricks in a flooded waterway under the cathedral. The entrance of this waterway lies among the real gravestones in the building’s central courtyard.

There are several closer views of this gated section leading to the waterway. The water can still be heard running underneath, amid the darkness and slime.

This same area is also seen from the library’s windows. Today, the open doorway seen in the original shot has been restored and now contains an actual door rather than merely a gap in the stone cloisters.

Finally, one of the adjacent features to the cathedral is also seen: Vicars’ Close. This ornate street is connected to the cathedral and is today exactly as seen in the film when Dattering runs along it.

Towards the end of the original run of Ghost Stories, Clark did something unusual: he directed an original story. Stigma has some of the series’ strongest location footage thanks to using the evocative village of Avebury in Wiltshire. 

Clive Exton’s eerie story is about a couple who want a stone removed from their garden, which backs on to a stone circle. Such meddling unleashes strange forces when the stone is lifted, resulting in Katharine (Kate Binchy) inexplicably bleeding from unseen wounds. The story is a perfect fit for Avebury and its famous menhirs. Though the cottage used isn’t in the heart of Avebury itself, Clark uses the real stones to situate it there.

Clark contrasts his fake stone circle, seen out of the window of the cottage, with the real stones of the circle surrounding Avebury. This shot, for example, shows the real stones from the main circle. The shot makes the most of the area’s natural ridges to create a silhouette.

The stones of the following shot are slightly different in that they effectively end the main circle at the bottom of what is known as The Avenue approaching Avebury.

We also see the gate at the end of the official avenue when Verity (Maxine Gordon) is picked up by her father (Peter Bowles).

Another local feature we see is the mysterious Silbury Hill. Though Clark chooses an unusual angle to shoot the ancient monument, which was apparently taken far off the main footpaths of the area, the actual feature itself is evidently unchanged, as it generally has been for thousands of years.

The story concludes on a melancholy note when the car taking Katherine to hospital has to stop because of her loss of blood. This is in the little car park of the Avebury Clubhouse, still standing, though undoubtedly changed since the time of filming.

Thanks to Jon Dear and Keith Scovell.

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