NOT THE MOST HAUNTED
Well-behaved polt and naughty kids
THE PHANTOM OF THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA
When asked by the Daily Telegraph about whether he had experienced any theatre ghosts, impresario and composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, who wrote the music for The Phantom of the Opera, a West End hit since its 1986 debut, confessed that he hadn’t. He did, however, believe he had experienced a well-behaved poltergeist in his central London home in Belgravia, saying, “I did have a house in Eaton Square which had a poltergeist. It would do things like take theatre scripts and put them in a neat pile in some obscure room. In the end we had to get a priest to come and bless it, and it left.” One social media wag reflecting on the story said, “When the paranormal is attempting to stop you writing your musicals you should probably listen.” theguardian.com, 3 Jan 2023.
“It would take theatre scripts and put them in a neat pile”
NO GHOST NEEDED
It only needed the rumour of a ghost to inflict far more damage than any polt could to Joanna and Matt Pittard’s £1 million house on the Isle of Wight.
While the Pittards were away on holiday, a group of seven children, some aged only 11, broke into the building. They then destroyed paintings, stained glass windows, chandeliers and a grandfather clock, took axes, chainsaws and sledgehammers to every room, and smeared walls with bleach, oil paint and ketchup. They caused more than £300,000 worth of damage, resulting in criminal damage charges. Locals have reported spotting a ghostly figure in the windows of the house and the father of one of the boys involved in the mayhem said “The house isn’t too far from where we live. I think they chose it because it was supposed to have a ghost.” According to the book Ghosts of Isle of Wight by Gay Baldwin “Everyone in the district knows of the haunted room in the north gable, and of the wasted face of an erring maidservant who was locked in the room for punishment and died there.” Insider.com, 5 Nov 2023.
PHANTOM FAKER
In Singapore, a court sentenced an unnamed 20-year-old man to 19 years in prison and 16 strokes of the cane for rape and sexual assault carried out under the pretext of exorcism. The man had developed romantic feelings for an old school friend, but was rebuffed because she was still in love with a former boyfriend. He then told her that he helped at a temple where he was a medium for the rabbit companion of Chinese mythological character Chang Er and that as a result, he could tell that her flat was full of ghosts. He then offered to carry out consecration rituals to rid the woman of the haunting. Initially he just used talismans, amulets and chanting, but he then persuaded the victim to take her clothes off and eventually to have sex with him as part of the “ritual”. However, when she told friends about the “consecration”, they advised her to go to the police, who arrested and charged the “medium”. straitstimes.com, 7 Sept 2023.