Everyman Theatre, Cheltenham - April & August 2007

April

This was a brief investigation at the theatre, who were kind enough to allow us to look around for a couple of hours in the evening. We plan to return for a full investigation in August.

An experienced group of Matt, Cara, Alison, Evan, Nina, Steve and myself visited the theatre on this evening. Unfortunately it became clear during the evening that there was a function taking place in another part of the building as well as other people in the theatre, so it was difficult to rely on any noises or movements that were experienced.

We started in the cellar area underneath the front of the theatre building. This felt a very quiet and calm area so we didn’t linger there. We then entered the theatre proper and started exploring the various levels. When we investigated the Dress Circle a number of lock-off cameras and trigger objects were set up. It was only as we left the area that we realised that Cara, who had sat at the back while we were in there had become overcome with a feeling of sadness and had tears running down her cheeks - a very unusual occurrence for her. Not far in front of where she was sat was a seat where the spirit of a woman has been said to have been seen, though Cara was unaware of this.

On leaving this part of the theatre Cara recovered and we headed up into the area high above the stage called the ‘Grid’. Apparently things have been experienced up there but on this occasion nothing of note occurred. We headed down to the stage area but noises we experienced there were attributed to other people in the building. When entering the stalls area Nina thought she may have sensed something while passing between two rows, which she couldn’t replicate later. Attempts at calling out on the stage failed to elicit any definite responses.

 We concluded with a return visit to the Dress Circle to collect our equipment and see if any other effects could be observed. This time Cara and everybody else felt fine, but both Nina and myself separately heard a squeaky voice-like noise apparently from the area we were in, but with the amount of other activity from people in the theatre it could hardly be ascribed to spirits.

The theatre staff made us feel very welcome and we looked forward to returning soon.

August

We returned to the theatre for a longer investigation in August and had some interesting experiences. All of us from the previous investigation returned together with John from ‘GhostKnights’ who we had invited to join us for this investigation. This time we had the theatre to ourselves so we should be able to rule out activity by anybody else in the building - and it certainly seemed that the building was keen to see us again.

On arrival we immediately made for the stage where we started to set up our gear. immediately it was noted that it felt very warm to us despite the air-thermometer only indicating 20 degrees C. Nina heard some noises in the far right-hand corner when she went on a walk round while setting up. John felt the presence of a large blonde haired lady with a strange hat stood at the far end of the stage, the caretaker informed him that the description fitted a German opera singer with the name of ‘Brunne Helder’

Now we set off to do investigations of other areas of the theatre. A number of us were able to go into the dome area above the auditorium, but some of us decided against the experience of ascending the vertical ladder necessary to enter it. Then we visited several other parts of the auditorium but without any event of note and it looked as though it was going to be a quiet night, but we were wrong.

We decided to carry out the first vigil in the dark in the Dress Circle, where Cara had felt strong emotions on her previous visit. We held a quiet and uneventful vigil there but this changed when we asked for the theatre lights to be put back on by Rob, the theatre staff member who was with us. As he threw the light switches we heard the sound of music starting from somewhere in the auditorium. Gradually this became louder and we realised it was the sound of ‘Land of Hope and Glory’. We eventually tracked this down to a radio/cassette plugged in at the back of the stage which had become turned on just as Radio 2 had started to play that piece of music. We checked that the equipment did not have some sort of alarm fitted and Rob demonstrated that there was no way that it could have been switched on from the lighting switch panel. A couple of us had initially felt we saw some movement in the area of the radio/cassette during the vigil but had thought it was an optical illusion.

We were still discussing this incident when several of the group saw a light suddenly light up on the lighting panel indicating that the lights under the stage had come on - they immediately rushed down there to check that no-one had switched it on., but they found the area empty with the lights turned on. This should not have been the case as there was only two ways of switching them on - manually using the lighting board or with the light switches down there - but it looked like neither had been used!

We wondered if we were being invited down there by an unseen force so we all headed down there. However Nina quickly had to head out of there as she couldn’t stand the feeling in there, something I had never seen her do before. The rest of us went in and immediately started to feel odd feelings of being either hot or cold, however our equipment showed that temperature and humidity had little difference from elsewhere in the building. John picked up on a hanging in the area. As everyone was feeling rather odd so we started to carry out a vigil. When we did this the atmosphere seemed to change quite suddenly and the place felt much better. Nina later came down and also felt that the atmosphere had changed - but whilst she had been up on the stage she had heard a whistling sound, apparently the sound traditionally used to communicate from the stage to the ‘grid’ up above. At this point it may be worth noting that an actor apparently was doing an acrobatic stunt over the stage and the rope attached to the ‘grid’ broke and he fell through the stage into the area below - maybe he was the person John and Nina felt had experienced and he was having fun with us. We hoped this would continue.

On returning to the stage John also picked up on a figure having a heart attack - apparently Harry Corbett had suffered a heart attack on that stage.

We then visited other areas of the theatre without any event and eventually we went up to the top level and the ‘grid’ area - we stood on this see-through platform above the stage in darkness. We had been there for some time and were just about to finish the vigil when Nina suddenly fell forward - was this due to disorientation in the dark, or the push of an unseen hand?

We carried out a seance on the stage to finish with but again there was little activity and we decided to finish the investigation at 0200 wondering if our early experiences had been the result of the paranormal or a case of dodgy electrics in the theatre.