What Do We Know About Joanna Lumley & Tobias Menzies’ Christmas Ghost Story
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The Room in the Tower is based on E.F. Benson's tale from 1912
Though the franchise dates back to the 1970s, A Ghost Story for Christmas is becoming synonymous with actor and increasingly prolific writer Mark Gatiss. Penning and directing his first Ghost Story for Christmas 2013, Gatiss has worked on seven stories total, with his terrifying tales becoming a staple of Christmas telly annually since 2021. And 2025 will be no different: Gatiss has mined the early 20th century for inspiration and his next Ghost Story for Christmas is based on a short story by E.F. Benson, A Room in the Tower (1912). Here’s everything we know so far.
BBC’s A Ghost Story for Christmas Will Return In 2025
We have a star-studded Christmas to count down the days to: Mark Gatiss’ eighth Ghost Story for Christmas will star Joanna Lumley and Tobias Menzies, set in the inter-war years and based on E.F. Benson’s tale, A Room in the Tower (1912).
Also starring Nancy Carroll, Ben Mansfield and Polly Walker, we’re told to expect an ‘atmospheric treat where dream meets terrifying reality,’ according to BBC commissioning editor Mark Bell.
What Will Happen?
The action of the next Ghost Story for Christmas, A Room in the Tower, centres on Roger Winstanley (Menzies), who for 15 years has been haunted by a recurring nightly nightmare: he is invited to spend the night in an friend’s house, and is assigned a room in the tower – a space that fills him with dread though he isn’t sure why.
Roger finds his fellow guests quiet and grim, and while the dream varies every night, the cast of characters stays the same – though they seem to grow older and stranger with each instalment.
In his waking life, Roger is invited to his friend’s country house, which bares a striking resemblance to the house of his dreams. Nightmare and reality collide when Roger is invited to stay the night in the room in the tower.
According to the BBC, A Ghost Story for Christmas: A Room in the Tower was filmed at Cobham Hall in Kent earlier this year. Unfortunately for any set-jetting fanatics, Cobham Hall is a private day and boarding school so you sadly cannot visit to stay the night for yourself. Our comisserations to the child who lives in the room in the tower.
‘I’ve always wanted to adapt the great E.F. Benson’s ghost stories and this is one of his chilling best,’ says writer and director Gatiss, who typically bases his Ghost Story films on spooky short stories of days of yore. His muse of many films is M. R. James, with Gatiss’ The Tractate Middoth (2013), Martin’s Close (2019), The Mezzotint (2021) and Count Magnus (2022) all based on the famous ghost story writer’s work. That said most of the BBC’s Ghost Story instalments were based on James’ work before Gatiss came aboard, including five films in the ’70s and films in 2005, 2006 and 2010. But in 2023 Gatiss bucked the trend, adapting Arthur Conan Doyle’s Lot No. 249 instead, and following suit with Edith Nesbit’s Man Sized Marble in 2024.
Mrs Dorman (MONICA DOLAN) in A Ghost Story for Christmas: Woman of Stone. (© BBC/Adorable Media/Kieran McGuigan)
‘I’m also very grateful to have been able to continue the most Christmassy of Christmas traditions,’ Gatiss adds. ‘The Room in the Tower has been prepared for you – and with Tobias Menzies and the legendary Dame Joanna Lumley to boot!’
Gatiss’ annual Ghost Story films have attracted stellar acting talent in recent years: last year Celia Imrie and Monica Dolan led Man Sized Marble, while the year before Gatiss attracted Kit Harington and Freddie Fox to his Christmas project.
A Ghost Story for Christmas is not Gatiss’ only annual festive project: his version of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol debuted in 2021, returned in 2023 and is set to play again this Christmas. The actor-writer, though most recognisible for his role in the BBC’s Sherlock, has been prolific behind the scenes in recent years, penning seven episodes of Sherlock, creating Dracula (2020) and creating and starring in U&Alibi’s recent runaway hit Bookish.
Release Date
No solid date just yet, but we expect A Ghost Story for Christmas: A Room in the Tower to air on BBC Two and iPlayer on Christmas Eve 2025.
