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On that note, there's quite an entertaining blog post about the Edinburgh Playhouse here. This mentions 'Albert' - of whom I remember talk, but not much in the way of detail.

I put several shows into the Edinburgh Playhouse - a big barn of a place, not your typical picturesquely haunted Edwardian pile - and at one time knew both Skeggsy and Smeeks, although it's over twenty years ago and I doubt they'd remember me now. (I also met a partner of several subsequent years there).

It's actually a really good piece - gives you an idea about the ghost, but also the camaraderie of backstage life, which is nowhere near as posh as all the other things we associate with theatre (Smeeks, for instance, played with The Exploited). Back in the day it could be a bit wild - as I've said recently on another thread:
Wasn't that the 1981 gig when the Jam were playing down the road and fights between The Barmy Army ?
 
On that note, there's quite an entertaining blog post about the Edinburgh Playhouse here. This mentions 'Albert' - of whom I remember talk, but not much in the way of detail.

I put several shows into the Edinburgh Playhouse - a big barn of a place, not your typical picturesquely haunted Edwardian pile - and at one time knew both Skeggsy and Smeeks, although it's over twenty years ago and I doubt they'd remember me now. (I also met a partner of several subsequent years there).

It's actually a really good piece - gives you an idea about the ghost, but also the camaraderie of backstage life, which is nowhere near as posh as all the other things we associate with theatre (Smeeks, for instance, played with The Exploited). Back in the day it could be a bit wild - as I've said recently on another thread:
Went on a wander round the Playhouse to take some photos for a talk on its Ghosts for Edinburgh Fortean Society. I ended up crawling out on top of the roof of the highest box to get a good view of the whole interior. Went to a seance in there as well, can’t remember anything happening.
 
Before I start actually reading the article, I have to share this one question: If the hallway is brightly lit with electric ceiling lights, why is Ms. Aldred carrying a candelabra with three candles?

* * *

The article is fun--thanks for posting it, gordonrutter!
 
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Before I start actually reading the article, I have to share this one question: If the hallway is brightly lit with electric ceiling lights, why is Ms. Aldred carrying a candelabra with three candles?
Perhaps if you read the article...
 
Yes, yes! It is the shadowy presence of Albert which makes extra lights necessary!

There were many points where I could play skeptic and argue for prosaic causes of the odd happenings, but that would sound dismissive, and I don't intend that. My first thought of the first Albert sighting, though, was that it a homeless man entered to get out of the cold, and then dealt with the security office very adroitly.

What impressed me the most in reading the article was the sense of how challenging it must be to take care of such a huge and complex building.
 
Yes, yes! It is the shadowy presence of Albert which makes extra lights necessary!

There were many points where I could play skeptic and argue for prosaic causes of the odd happenings, but that would sound dismissive, and I don't intend that. My first thought of the first Albert sighting, though, was that it a homeless man entered to get out of the cold, and then dealt with the security office very adroitly.

What impressed me the most in reading the article was the sense of how challenging it must be to take care of such a huge and complex building.
The original article from ‘99 does actually make more of the rolling blackness throughout the theatre including a story of it rolling down a corridor and spilling out through a pair of doors. Albert is always described as a person whereas this blackness is a consistent thing and feeling, I do know one or two people who have experienced it there.
Back in ‘99 there were areas of the theatre you just really weren’t allowed in because of the shocking state of repair.
 
Cromer Pavilion Theatre is supposed to be haunted, I've known loads of people who've worked in the building and not one of them ever reported any paranormal experiences. The Most Haunted crew spent the night there, not the most exciting of episodes if I'm being honest but if anyone fancies watching it, I'll link to it anyway ..

 
A nice BBC R4 programme here about ghostly happenings in theatres: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06kgghc

"From Drury Lane to the old playhouses of Edinburgh, tales of long-dead stage-hands, actors and theatre managers who haunt the stage abound. These stories have usually only been whispered about backstage. Until now. Actor Jack Shepherd gets fellow actors and theatre staff to open up about their ghostly experiences in some of Britain's spookiest theatres.

He hears of the ghost of Joseph Grimaldi at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, where actors believe the clown gives them a shove in the back when they've missed their cue or their mark on stage. There's the tale of the ghost of the 19th century actress Sarah Bernhardt, who is said to haunt the corridors of Brighton's Theatre Royal, and of the man in 18th century dress who appeared to a former artistic director of the old Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh:

"I realised I wasn't alone. I looked up and saw these buckled shoes and a man standing in the ash of the fireplace, wearing thick stockings and breeches. He was a very tangible, burly man in his late 40s, and he looked at me with the same curiosity that I looked at him, as if to say, 'What are you doing in my house?'"

Jack is our sceptical guide. Strange things happen in the theatre, and there is usually an explanation. Only what is it?

So widespread is the belief in haunted theatres in Britain that many have a 'ghost light' burning on stage all through the night. In Shakespeare's time it would have been a candle. Now it is a single bare lightbulb, intended to keep the ghosts at bay."
 
A nice BBC R4 programme here about ghostly happenings in theatres: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06kgghc

"From Drury Lane to the old playhouses of Edinburgh, tales of long-dead stage-hands, actors and theatre managers who haunt the stage abound. These stories have usually only been whispered about backstage. Until now. Actor Jack Shepherd gets fellow actors and theatre staff to open up about their ghostly experiences in some of Britain's spookiest theatres.

He hears of the ghost of Joseph Grimaldi at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, where actors believe the clown gives them a shove in the back when they've missed their cue or their mark on stage. There's the tale of the ghost of the 19th century actress Sarah Bernhardt, who is said to haunt the corridors of Brighton's Theatre Royal, and of the man in 18th century dress who appeared to a former artistic director of the old Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh:

"I realised I wasn't alone. I looked up and saw these buckled shoes and a man standing in the ash of the fireplace, wearing thick stockings and breeches. He was a very tangible, burly man in his late 40s, and he looked at me with the same curiosity that I looked at him, as if to say, 'What are you doing in my house?'"

Jack is our sceptical guide. Strange things happen in the theatre, and there is usually an explanation. Only what is it?

So widespread is the belief in haunted theatres in Britain that many have a 'ghost light' burning on stage all through the night. In Shakespeare's time it would have been a candle. Now it is a single bare lightbulb, intended to keep the ghosts at bay."
Parallel Universe for the encounter with the Ghost with the buckled shoe ?
 
I have a vague recollection of there being a ghost associated with the Arts Theatre in Stamford. I spent a lot of time backstage there - my dad was a keen amateur dramatist, used to get my mum involved too - and if I remember right, the ghost used to hang around in the bar. Theatrical spirit, you might say? If anybody can flesh that out, I'd be interested to hear!
 
Bit of a backstory here. I'm watching Lucy Worsley on TV and she showed us a mediaeval crypt in a Berkshire field.

It is the only rermaining part of Ladye Place, a mansion originally dating from the fourteenth century. The crypt was the site of secret meetings by plotters of the Glorious Revolution.

Anyway... I'd heard of Ladye Place from a book I loved (to scare myself with) as a kid, Harry Ludlam's awesome The Restless Ghosts Of Ladye Place.
So I did a little Googling and found the full text of the book online, with its terrifying first chapter all about, yes, a ghost in a theatre.

The Restless Ghosts of Ladye Place

I was really too young to read this book first time around. The image of Thorne's face gliding along the top of the stage gave me nightmares. I probably wet the bed.
Worth every minute. Now you, too, can feel the warmth.
 
Cromer Pavilion Theatre is supposed to be haunted, I've known loads of people who've worked in the building and not one of them ever reported any paranormal experiences. The Most Haunted crew spent the night there, not the most exciting of episodes if I'm being honest but if anyone fancies watching it, I'll link to it anyway ..


I do not know how many people feel the ‘sickening feeling‘ when entering Crowsmere but I expect eveyone shares a tangible sense of disappointment.
 
Cromer Pavilion Theatre is supposed to be haunted, I've known loads of people who've worked in the building and not one of them ever reported any paranormal experiences. The Most Haunted crew spent the night there, not the most exciting of episodes if I'm being honest but if anyone fancies watching it, I'll link to it anyway ..

At around 6min 45, Yvette talks about the weird stuff that happens... ’People seeing themselves in mirrors’. Is this unusual for Cromer?
 
Bit of a backstory here. I'm watching Lucy Worsley on TV and she showed us a mediaeval crypt in a Berkshire field.

It is the only rermaining part of Ladye Place, a mansion originally dating from the fourteenth century. The crypt was the site of secret meetings by plotters of the Glorious Revolution.

Anyway... I'd heard of Ladye Place from a book I loved (to scare myself with) as a kid, Harry Ludlam's awesome The Restless Ghosts Of Ladye Place.
So I did a little Googling and found the full text of the book online, with its terrifying first chapter all about, yes, a ghost in a theatre.

The Restless Ghosts of Ladye Place

I was really too young to read this book first time around. The image of Thorne's face gliding along the top of the stage gave me nightmares. I probably wet the bed.
Worth every minute. Now you, too, can feel the warmth.

Today you laugh, @titch, but tomorrow you change your sheets.

I've just read the first chapter again and will be crashing the Tena at bedtime.
 
I was really too young to read this book first time around.
My mother taught all 6 of us to read and write before we went to school so we were quite proficient readers at a very early age and one of my very first ghost books was Lord Halifax Ghost Book which, was still quite a difficult read at age 10 ish. A paperback copy still turns up At home every now and then and I’ll flip through a few stories before it disappears back into a drawer or it gets knocked under a bed.
 
My mother taught all 6 of us to read and write before we went to school so we were quite proficient readers at a very early age and one of my very first ghost books was Lord Halifax Ghost Book which, was still quite a difficult read at age 10 ish. A paperback copy still turns up At home every now and then and I’ll flip through a few stories before it disappears back into a drawer or it gets knocked under a bed.

The Harry Ludlam books are lightly written, almost conversational, and a lot of the text is composed of direct quotes from his interviewees.
This makes them both an easy read and plausible, often disturbingly so.
 
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A couple of Harry Ludlam's are on the internet archive to borrow
https://archive.org/details/restlessghostsof00ludl/mode/2up
https://archive.org/details/TheMummyOfBirchenBower/mode/1up
with suitably terrifying covers I see :)

Also Lord Halifax's Ghost Book
https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.207735
and a downloadable ebook of his 'further stories
https://archive.org/details/furtherstoriesfromlordhaliflordhalifax
Ludlum brought more books out in the' 90s. I'd like to track them down!
 
Albert is always described as a person whereas this blackness is a consistent thing and feeling, I do know one or two people who have experienced it there.
Witnessing a rolling shadowy thing would be a very disturbing experience I think. (Except, of course, for Escargot!)
 
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Hot on the tail of her appearance as a fraudulent medium in the latest movie version of Blithe Spirit, the indomitable Judi Dench ("Fuck being 86 years old!") gives an illuminating interview - including her brief experience of a theatre ghost:

https://www.theguardian.com/film/20...inds-eye-im-six-foot-and-willowy-and-about-39

The theatre ghost she saw was a formally-dressed man who ran down the stairs in front of her. In that context it could be anybody!

I enjoyed the new Blithe Spirit. The flying crockery was a nice touch, an homage to the older versions.

Ah now you say fraudulent medium, and Madame Arcati has her Medium Card ripped up because of dodgy practices, but she does indeed manage to summon the shade of Elvira, along with those of the recently-dead Ruth and of her own beloved late husband.

She is like Oda Mae Brown; an apparent charlatan with genuine abilities.
 
Hot on the tail of her appearance as a fraudulent medium in the latest movie version of Blithe Spirit, the indomitable Judi Dench ("Fuck being 86 years old!") gives an illuminating interview - including her brief experience of a theatre ghost:

https://www.theguardian.com/film/20...inds-eye-im-six-foot-and-willowy-and-about-39
"She gets up each morning determined to keep herself busy. She crawls back to bed with most of the tasks left undone." I don't feel so bad about myself now. I'm as productive as Judi Dench!
 
"She gets up each morning determined to keep herself busy. She crawls back to bed with most of the tasks left undone." I don't feel so bad about myself now. I'm as productive as Judi Dench!
I'm like this.
 
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