Title screen, showing Barchester Cathedral. Doctor Black is seen passing through the arch.
Episode no.
Episode 1
Directed by
Lawrence Gordon Clark
Written by
Lawrence Gordon Clark
Based on
"The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral" by M. R. James
Produced by
Lawrence Gordon Clark
Original air date
24 December 1971 (1971-12-24)
Running time
45 minutes
Guest appearances
Robert Hardy as Archdeacon Haynes
Clive Swift as Dr. Black
Thelma Barlow as Letitia Haynes
Will Leighton as Cathedral Librarian
Harold Bennett as Archdeacon Pulteney
Erik Chitty as Priest
David Pugh as John
Ambrose Coghill as Museum Curator
Episode chronology
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Next → "A Warning to the Curious"
List of episodes
"The Stalls of Barchester" is a short film which serves as the first episode of the British supernatural anthology television series A Ghost Story for Christmas. Written, produced, and directed by the series' creator Lawrence Gordon Clark,[1] it is based on the ghost story "The Stalls of Barchester Cathedral" by M. R. James, first published in the collection More Ghost Stories (1911). It stars Robert Hardy as Archdeacon Haynes of the fictional Barchester Cathedral, whose mysterious death is investigated 50 years later by the scholar Dr. Black (Clive Swift), and first aired on BBC1 on 24 December 1971.[2]
Clark was inspired to initiate the series by Whistle and I'll Come to You (1968), based on a James story and directed by Jonathan Miller for the BBC documentary strand Omnibus, and the oral tradition of telling ghost stories at Christmas of which James' stories were a part. It was commissioned by Paul Fox and, like Miller's film, produced by the BBC Documentary Unit; Clark's approach was likewise inspired by his background as a documentarian, particularly his insistance on location shooting at Norwich Cathedral on colour 16mm film, which would become hallmarks of the series' original run.[3]
Since airing, the film has received praise as a work of supernatural television and horror cinema, and as a strong inaugral instalment of what would become a long-running strand.[4][5]
^Kerekes, David (2003). Creeping Flesh: The Horror Fantasy Film Book. London: Headpress. pp. 12–15. ISBN 978-1-900486-36-1.
^"The Stalls of Barchester". British Film Institute Database. Archived from the original on 1 June 2009. Retrieved 22 August 2010.
^Broughton, Lee (30 November 2020). "A Ghost Story for Christmas - The Stalls of Barchester". Horrified Magazine. Retrieved 1 June 2024.
^Bass, George (21 December 2021). "50 years of Ghost Stories for Christmas, the BBC's classic strand of festive terror". BFI. Retrieved 2 June 2024.
^Higson, Richard (9 November 2021). "A Ghost Story for Christmas - The Stalls of Barchester". Horrified Magazine. Retrieved 1 June 2024.
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