Lot No.249: the ultimate Ghost Story For Christmas

And this year, Doctor Who and Sherlock star Mark Gatiss, who studied drama at Bretton Hall College near Barnsley, is serving up some festive frights with A Ghost Story For Christmas: Lot No.249.

Based on the Arthur Conan Doyle short story Lot No. 249, it stars Game Of Thrones’ Kit Harington and White House Farm’s Freddie Fox and tells the story of a group of Oxford students, with Fox’s character Edward Bellingham focused on researching ancient Egypt, including a mysterious Lot No.249.

The cast also features York-born Frankenstein’s Creature’s James Swanton, Dracula star John Heffernan, and Leonardo actor Colin Ryan and more.

This will be the latest in a string of ghost stories for Christmas from Gatiss on the BBC, following, amongst others, 2021’s The Mezzotint starring Rory Kinnear, Martin’s Close in 2019, The Dead Room in 2018, The Tractate Middoth in 2013 and Crooked House in 2008.

WHY IS LOT NO. 249 A GOOD GHOST STORY FOR CHRISTMAS?

MG: It’s the original “mummy” story as far as we know. It’s certainly one of the first stories to feature a mummy as an instrument of revenge. So everything we associate with the mummy, from Hollywood to Hammer, starts here. It’s got a terrific cast and it should be a delicious Christmas treat.

WHAT IS LOT NO. 249 ABOUT?

MG: It’s a short story by Arthur Conan Doyle and it’s about a group of students at a college in Oxford in 1881.

One of them is a square-jawed Victorian hero, one of them is a foreign student from Siam who is rather less worldly and the third one is a scholar of eastern languages called Edward Bellingham who has an unhealthy interest in reviving the dead.

He buys an auction lot which is a mummy – Lot No. 249.

YOU HAVE ADAPTED SHERLOCK HOLMES STORIES FOR TV PREVIOUSLY. WAS THERE A BIG DIFFERENCE STYLISTICALLY BETWEEN THIS AND HOLMES’S STORIES?

MG: As a fan and a scholar of Doyle, sometimes you can read a story which feels almost like a Sherlock Holmes story and there are certain stylistic and linguistic elements where you can tell it’s written by Doyle.

As someone who knows Sherlock Holmes stories as well as I do, when you read a story without Holmes it’s like having a missing chapter – there’s a strange pleasure to it.

WHAT WAS IT LIKE WORKING WITH THE CAST?

MG: It was a joyous experience – I’ve worked with John Heffernan on Dracula.

James Swanton who plays the mummy is a fantastic physical performer who I worked with recently on The Quatermass Experiment at Alexandra Palace.

A Ghost Story For Christmas: Lot No.249 airs on BBC Two and the iPlayer from 10pm on December 24.