Ghost Light (TV story)

Ghost Light was the second story of Season 26 of Doctor Who. Although two stories followed it when broadcast, it was the last story of the classic series to be produced and the last to be filmed at BBC Television Centre.

The aspect of Ghost Light that is frequently highlighted is the plot. The serial seems to follow an indistinct storyline with various sub-plots staggered throughout.

Synopsis
London 1983: an old house mysteriously burns to the ground. One hundred years earlier, the Doctor and Ace arrive at a sinister mansion in the rural hamlet of Perivale. Horrors old and new await the Doctor amongst the peculiar residents of Gabriel Chase...but it is Ace who must confront her own worst nightmares when she discovers that her past and the house's future are inextricably linked...

Part 1
The Seventh Doctor brings Ace to Gabriel Chase, an old house that she once burnt down in her home town of Perivale near London. The year is 1883 and the house is presided over by the mysterious Josiah Samuel Smith.

It is a most mysterious place, where the serving women brandish guns and the butler is a Neanderthal named Nimrod. Other occupants include Gwendoline, the daughter of the original owners of the house who have now disappeared, the calculating housekeeper Lady Pritchard, the explorer Redvers Fenn-Cooper, who has seen something which has driven him insane, and the Reverend Ernest Matthews, opponent of the theory of evolution which Smith has done much to spread.

The TARDIS arrives at Gabriel Chase. It turns out that Ace had visited the house in 1983, and had felt an evil presence, and the Doctor's curiosity drives him to seek the answers. Something is also alive and evolving in the cellar beneath the house and when Ace investigates she finds two animated and dangerous husks.

Part 2
In rescuing Ace, the Doctor releases an evolving creature trapped in the cellar known as Control. The party moves to ground level and Control remains trapped in the cellar for the moment. The cellar is in fact a vast stone spaceship. The Doctor works his way through the stuffed animals in Gabriel Chase and eventually finds a human in suspended animation, an Inspector Mackenzie, who came to the house two years earlier in search of the owners. The Doctor revives him and together they seek to unlock the mysteries of Gabriel Chase.

The husks which attacked Ace were the remains of Smith, an alien who has been evolving into forms approximating a human and casting off his old husks as an insect would. For his pains Smith transforms Matthews into an ape and places him in a display case. The Doctor helps Control release the trapped creature from the cellar, a being known as Light who takes the form of an angel.

Part 3
Thousands of years in the past, an alien spaceship came to Earth to catalogue all life on the planet. After completing its task and collecting some samples, which included Nimrod, the leader Light went into slumber. By 1881 the ship had returned to Earth.

While Control remained imprisoned on the ship to serve as the "control" subject of the scientific investigation, events transpired such that Smith, the "survey agent", mutinied against Light, keeping him in hibernation on the ship. Smith began evolving into the era's dominant life-form - a Victorian gentleman - and also took over the house. By 1883 Smith managed to lure and capture the explorer Fenn-Cooper within his den. Utilising Fenn-Cooper's association with Queen Victoria, he plans to get close to her so that he can assassinate her and subsequently take control of the British Empire.

Light is displeased by all the change that has occurred on the planet while he was asleep. While Light tries to make sense of all the change, Smith tries to keep his plan intact, but events are moving beyond his control. Light turns Gwendoline and her missing mother, revealed to be Mrs. Pritchard, to stone in a bid to stop the speed of evolution; while Inspector Mackenzie meets a sticky end and is turned into a primordial soup to serve at dinner. As Control tries to "evolve" into a Lady, and Ace tries to come to grips with her feelings about the house, the Doctor himself tries to keep the upper hand in all the events that have been set in motion. The Doctor finally convinces Light of the futility of opposing evolution, which causes him to overload and dissipate into the surrounding house. It was this presence that Ace sensed and which caused her to burn the house down in 1983. Also, Control's complete evolution into a Lady derail's Smith's plan as Fenn-Cooper, having freed himself from Smith's brainwashing, chooses to side with her instead of him. In the end, with Smith now the new Control creature imprisoned on the ship, Control, Fenn-Cooper and Nimrod set off in the alien ship to explore the universe.

Cast

 * The Seventh Doctor - Sylvester McCoy
 * Ace - Sophie Aldred
 * Josiah Samuel Smith - Ian Hogg
 * Light - John Hallam
 * Lady Pritchard - Sylvia Syms
 * Redvers Fenn-Cooper - Michael Cochrane
 * Control - Sharon Duce
 * Gwendoline - Katharine Schlesinger
 * Nimrod - Carl Forgione
 * Reverend Ernest Matthews - John Nettleton
 * Mrs Grose - Brenda Kempner
 * Inspector Mackenzie - Frank Windsor

Crew

 * Writer - Marc Platt
 * Assistant Floor Manager - Stephen Garwood
 * Costumes - Ken Trew
 * Designer - Nick Somerville
 * Incidental Music - Mark Ayres
 * Make-Up - Joan Stribling
 * Production Assistant - Valerie Whiston
 * Production Associate - June Collins
 * Script Editor - Andrew Cartmel
 * Special Sounds - Dick Mills
 * Studio Lighting - Henry Barber
 * Studio Sound - Scott Talbott, Keith Bowden
 * Stunt Arranger - Paul Heasman
 * Theme Arrangement - Keff McCulloch
 * Title Music - Ron Grainer
 * Visual Effects - Malcolm James
 * Producer - John Nathan-Turner
 * Director - Alan Wareing

Story notes

 * This story had working titles of; The Bestiary and Life-Cycle.
 * As revealed in the production notes for the DVD release, the story was renamed Das Haus der tausend Schrecken (The House of the Thousand Frights/Horrors) upon translation into German.
 * Ghost Light was the last serial of the original series ever produced, with the last recorded sequence being the final scene between Mrs Pritchard and Gwendoline. It was not, however, the last to be screened — both The Curse of Fenric and Survival, produced beforehand, followed it in transmission order.
 * The story evolved out of an earlier, rejected script entitled Lungbarrow. It was to be set on Gallifrey in the Doctor's ancestral home and deal with the Doctor's past, but producer John Nathan-Turner felt that it revealed too much of the Doctor's origins. It was reworked to make both evolution and the idea of an ancient house central to the story. Marc Platt used elements of his original idea for his Virgin New Adventures novel Lungbarrow.

Ratings

 * Part 1 - 4.2 million viewers
 * Part 2 - 4.0 million viewers
 * Part 3 - 4.0 million viewers

Myths

 * Few of the cast could make sense of the storyline. This is true, as confirmed by cast interviews included with the DVD release of the story.

Filming locations

 * Stanton Court, 11 Greenhill, Weymouth, Dorset
 * BBC Television Centre (TC3), Shepherd's Bush, London

Production errors

 * When the Doctor tests Redvers for radiation a cameraman's reflection can be seen in the door of the open cabinet that Redvers is looking into.
 * Katharine Schlesinger's name was spelt incorrectly as 'Katherine Schlesinger' for the broadcast of parts 1 and 2, and for the whole serial in Radio Times.
 * When Ace pushes the maid into the room and slams the door behind her in episode 3, there is a bad case of wobbly wall syndrome. The wall proves equally unstable a few scenes later, as Gwendoline and the maid break out.

Continuity

 * In NA: Blood Heat it is revealed that Manisha (Ace's friend) died in the firebomb that torched her flat.
 * IDW: The Time Machination reveals that Torchwood One investigated the events at Gabriel Chase.

Timeline

 * Ghost Light occurs after PDA: Relative Dementias
 * Ghost Light occurs before DW: The Curse of Fenric

DVD, VHS and home audio release
DVD releases

Released as Doctor Who: Ghost Light.

Released:
 * Region 2 20th September 2004
 * PAL - BBC DVD BBCDVD1352


 * Region 4 3rd February 2005
 * Region 1 7th June 2005
 * NTSC - Warner Video E2218

Content:
 * Light in Dark Places Documentary - A look back at the making of the story.
 * Deleted/Extended Scenes
 * Shooting Ghosts - A unique look at the studio recording process.
 * Writer's Question Time - Marc Platt answers questions at a 1990 Doctor Who convention.
 * 5.1 Mix
 * Music-only Option
 * Photo Gallery
 * Production Subtitles
 * Easter Eggs
 * Commentary: Sophie Aldred, Andrew Cartmel, Marc Platt, and Mark Ayres

Notes:
 * Editing for DVD release completed by Doctor Who Restoration Team.

VHS releases

Released as Doctor Who: Ghost Light.

Released:
 * UK May 1994
 * PAL - BBC Video BBCV5344


 * Australia/NZ July 1994
 * US June 1996
 * NTSC - Warner Video E1318

Audio Releases
 * The musical soundtrack of this story was released by Silva Screen in 1993.

Novelisation and its audiobook

 * Main article: Ghost Light (novelisation)


 * Novelised as Ghost Light in 1990 by Marc Platt.

Script book

 * In July 1993, Titan Books published the scripts for the serial as part of its Doctor Who: The Scripts line of books.