The original series of the BBC's A Ghost Story for Christmas ended in 1978, but the following year the slot it had vacated was filled with another ghost story. Produced and broadcast - like Jonathan Miller's 'Whistle and I'll Come to You' - as an episode of Omnibus, writer and director Leslie Megahey's 'Schalcken the Painter' is undoubtedly of interest to fans of the program it succeeded at Christmas 1979. Briefly considered for direction by Lawrence Gordon Clark and adapted from an existing short story (by Sheridan le Fanu), it is in many ways cut from the same cloth as A Ghost Story for Christmas. In other respects however, it is strikingly different.
Leslie Megahey retained complete creative control over 'Schalcken the Painter', having commissioned it the moment he became the series editor of Omnibus. In stark contrast to the episodes of A Ghost Story for Christmas, the play is directed like a docu-drama, with a sonorous and suitably academic-sounding voice-over from Charles Gray and minimal dialogue. Megahey pays great attention to detail when filming scenes such as Schalcken producing a miniature canvas, and when the gold is weighed and assessed. His grasp of mise-en-scéne is impressive: reproductions of paintings by the real Schalcken are used as props throughout, although the sets are inspired by the paintings of Vermeer. There's a also a lovely period-inspired soundtrack that wouldn't be out of place in a documentary about the real Godfried Schalcken.
Nevertheless, despite the style Megahey adopts, 'Schalcken the Painter' is not a docu-drama, but rather a work of fiction. The story sees the young Schalcken falling in love with his mentor Gerrit Dou's daughter Rose, only to lose her when Dou marries her off in exchange for gold to the ghoulish Vanderhausen. Too cowardly or too concerned with his own career prospects as Dou's apprentice - or both - he weasels out of Rose's suggestion that they could run away together, instead making weak promises to buy her marriage bond out when he is rich and famous. Later, Rose escapes from Vanderhausen, only to be sought out and retrieved by him; years later, Schalcken is reunited with her one final time during a strange and horrifying encounter in a church.
Much has been made of the themes explored by Megahey in 'Schalcken the Painter', which shows us a world of material greed and avarice, where vast quantities of food are consumed at lavish feasts, and women can be bought and sold. Vanderhausen convinces Gerrit Dou to sell Rose to him simply by offering him gold worth more than Dou can imagine, and so Dou surrenders Rose to a man who is not only much older than her and who terrifies her on their first meeting, but who is also quite possibly actually dead. In that respect, 'Schalcken the Painter' works impressively well, especially as Megahey reflects Dou's affluence in the props and sets of his house.
As a ghost story however, 'Schalcken the Painter' works less well. Megahey's cerebral approach and docu-drama style means that the play has a sterile atmosphere that fails to chill, not even the macabre ending when a naked Rose has sex in front Schalcken with her zombie husband. It doesn't help that John Justin's icy Vanderhausen never looks like anything other than a man with grey paint on his skin, or that Cheryl Kennedy is horribly hammy as Rose. This is a shame, as Gray brings gravitas to his voice over, Maurice Denham is superb as Gerrit Dou, and Jeremy Clyde broods convincingly as Schalcken. Nevertheless, 'Schalcken the Painter' has a weird beauty to it as a result of being so handsomely made that it is definitely worth watching and for all its intellectual pretensions, it is guaranteed to be of interest to fans of A Ghost Story for Christmas.
Leslie Megahey retained complete creative control over 'Schalcken the Painter', having commissioned it the moment he became the series editor of Omnibus. In stark contrast to the episodes of A Ghost Story for Christmas, the play is directed like a docu-drama, with a sonorous and suitably academic-sounding voice-over from Charles Gray and minimal dialogue. Megahey pays great attention to detail when filming scenes such as Schalcken producing a miniature canvas, and when the gold is weighed and assessed. His grasp of mise-en-scéne is impressive: reproductions of paintings by the real Schalcken are used as props throughout, although the sets are inspired by the paintings of Vermeer. There's a also a lovely period-inspired soundtrack that wouldn't be out of place in a documentary about the real Godfried Schalcken.
Nevertheless, despite the style Megahey adopts, 'Schalcken the Painter' is not a docu-drama, but rather a work of fiction. The story sees the young Schalcken falling in love with his mentor Gerrit Dou's daughter Rose, only to lose her when Dou marries her off in exchange for gold to the ghoulish Vanderhausen. Too cowardly or too concerned with his own career prospects as Dou's apprentice - or both - he weasels out of Rose's suggestion that they could run away together, instead making weak promises to buy her marriage bond out when he is rich and famous. Later, Rose escapes from Vanderhausen, only to be sought out and retrieved by him; years later, Schalcken is reunited with her one final time during a strange and horrifying encounter in a church.
Much has been made of the themes explored by Megahey in 'Schalcken the Painter', which shows us a world of material greed and avarice, where vast quantities of food are consumed at lavish feasts, and women can be bought and sold. Vanderhausen convinces Gerrit Dou to sell Rose to him simply by offering him gold worth more than Dou can imagine, and so Dou surrenders Rose to a man who is not only much older than her and who terrifies her on their first meeting, but who is also quite possibly actually dead. In that respect, 'Schalcken the Painter' works impressively well, especially as Megahey reflects Dou's affluence in the props and sets of his house.
As a ghost story however, 'Schalcken the Painter' works less well. Megahey's cerebral approach and docu-drama style means that the play has a sterile atmosphere that fails to chill, not even the macabre ending when a naked Rose has sex in front Schalcken with her zombie husband. It doesn't help that John Justin's icy Vanderhausen never looks like anything other than a man with grey paint on his skin, or that Cheryl Kennedy is horribly hammy as Rose. This is a shame, as Gray brings gravitas to his voice over, Maurice Denham is superb as Gerrit Dou, and Jeremy Clyde broods convincingly as Schalcken. Nevertheless, 'Schalcken the Painter' has a weird beauty to it as a result of being so handsomely made that it is definitely worth watching and for all its intellectual pretensions, it is guaranteed to be of interest to fans of A Ghost Story for Christmas.