This terrifying true ghost story stopped me sleeping – now it’s becoming a BBC drama

Picture the scene.

You’re a hip thirty-something (Yes, thirty-somethings can be hip) hanging out in one of the UK’s coolest cities.

After a long day of work, you head back to your inexpensive budget hotel, picking up a Beef & Tomato Pot Noodle along the way.

As you bed down for the night, you decide to pop on a BBC podcast to entertain you as you wind down, little realising you’ve just made one of the worst mistakes of your life.

What have you done wrong (Besides not choosing the Bombay Bad Boy flavour)?

You’ve unintentionally put on one of the scariest ghost stories you’ve ever heard in your life, and it’s going to scare you so much that you’re going to be unable to sleep that night.

Well, I don’t have to picture the scene because this literally happened to me a few years ago when I listened to The Witch Farm.

Created by Danny Robins, who’s best known these days for the Uncanny podcast, the Witch Farm blended drama and documentary to tell the story of the Rich family and the terrifying otherworldly encounters they had at Heol Fanog.

If, like me, you’ve never heard of Heol Fanog, it’s basically one of the UK’s most infamous real-life haunted houses.

While living there for seven years, the Rich family experienced all sorts of unexplained phenomena, including poltergeist activity, shadowy apparitions, and even alleged possessions.

To this day, the house has had more documented exorcisms than any other in British history and has been branded the Welsh Amityville by paranormal enthusiasts.

Now it’s becoming a BBC One TV show starring Gabrielle Creevy (The Guest, Black Doves) and Michael Socha (Showtrial, What It Feels Like For A Girl) as Liz and Bill Rich, as announced on Thursday, April 2.

An adaptation of that terrifying podcast, the four-part series will follow Liz and Bill as they abandon London to make a fresh start in Heol Fanog in the foothills of the Brecon Beacons in South Wales.

What starts as a dream come true, however, quickly becomes a nightmare as the couple – along with their teenage son – find themselves tormented by an otherworldly presence.

As things escalate, Bill starts to dig into the farmhouse’s history and quickly uncovers its nightmarish secrets.

Sound good, right?

Well, it should be considering it’s been written by Danny, who’s become one of the UK’s best known paranormal investigators.

Still, as scary as that synopsis is, it’s got nothing on the experience of listening to the podcast, which remains one of the most chilling media experiences I’ve ever had.

How are fans reacting to the news of the Witch Farm TV show?

I’m not the only one excited by the news of the TV show.

On X @LJSSockmonkey wrote: ‘Argh!!

This is amazing news.

I am so excited – I loved the podcast series.

This is going to be brilliant.’
@BloodyShellKen agreed, adding: ‘This is huge news!

I can’t wait to see it!’
However, @C601kraken had a slightly different take when they replied to Danny on X.

They wrote: ‘I’ll be honest.

I’m a MASSIVE fan of your work and actually excited, but tbh kinda wished you’d done a new case.

‘Only because the radio version is already so good (listened 3 times), but I get this will reach a wider audience and also new things to explore that weren’t covered?’

I’m reluctant to spoil too much of what happened to the Rich family, but what I found so effective about the podcast wasn’t the mention of ghosts, ghouls, and gore; it was that Danny interviewed the real Liz for the podcast.

So often when you listen to a ghost story podcast, they’re read by some trained narrator or acted out by the host.

It’s spooky for sure, but it does create a sense of disconnect, a feeling that what you’re being told isn’t quite real.

In Witch Farm, however, hearing a distressed Liz offer her side of the story cut through the artifice that this was some scary story told by a campfire.

Instead, it was a woman sharing something incredibly personal and not something she necessarily enjoyed reliving.

I hope that this new show can capture that… even if it does mean I might lose another evening of sleep.

It certainly sounds like Danny is going to try his hardest to keep the show as terrifying as possible.

‘Get ready for a supernatural thriller that plays out as the most deliciously dark detective story – an emotional rollercoaster that will have you gripped, moved and spine-tingled,’ he said in a statement.

‘I can’t wait to spook you out.’
‘Whether you’re already a fan of Danny’s work or are coming to the story of The Witch Farm for the first time, be prepared for some scares,’ added Lindsay Salt, Director of BBC Drama.

The Witch Farm does not have a release date yet, but we’ll keep you posted, and in the meantime, don’t have nightmares.

You can listen to The Witch Farm and Uncanny now on the BBC Sounds app.

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