Martin Freeman and Jim Broadbent to star in this year's Ghost Story for Christmas on BBC One

It's the ninth instalment of Mark Gatiss' festive TV tradition.

BBC Two has confirmed the return of A Ghost Story for Christmas later this year with a ninth instalment of Mark Gatiss' festive TV tradition. This year, he'll be opening the door to The Bride’s Chamber, adapted from Charles Dickens’ chilling tale and produced by Adorable Media.

1858. An inn with no name, an eccentric landlord and a lone traveller with a strangely familiar appearance. As he settles into his room for the night, the traveller is visited by an uncanny man in black, with a story to tell.

A Ghost Story for Christmas: The Bride's Chamber will star Jim Broadbent, Martin Freeman, Adrian Scarborough, Joe Armstrong, India Fowler and Lewis Shepherd and tells the tale of a spurned and vengeful suitor who manipulates a young woman and marries her to claim her fortune. But his murderous plans create his own purgatory.

Considered one of Dickens’ darkest tales, The Bride’s Chamber, originally published in 1858 as The Ghost in the Bride’s Chamber, is the latest supernatural short story to be brought to life by Mark Gatiss, following E.F. Benson’s The Room in the Tower in 2025; E. Nesbit’s Woman of Stone in 2024 and Arthur Conan Doyle’s Lot No. 249 in 2023.

Speaking ahead of this year's Ghost Story, Mark Gatiss said "I’m once more thrilled and honoured to bring another Ghost Story for Christmas to BBC Two. It’s unusual to find a Dickens rarity but this is it! A weird and nasty little treasure which lurks within a work co-written with the great Wilkie Collins. A lonely inn, an incognito traveller and a ghastly tale of warped obsession. Merry Christmas!"

To which Mark Bell, Commissioning Editor for BBC Arts, added "The Ghost Story for Christmas has become an essential dish on the festive TV menu, for audiences who love nothing more than settling in for a spine-tingling tale on a winter’s night."

"This year we’re delighted to bring you this spooky story by Charles Dickens brilliantly adapted and directed by Mark Gatiss, with a great cast, to coincide with a range of further Dickens-inspired programming set to air across the BBC in December as part of the National Year of Reading."

A Ghost Story for Christmas: The Bride's Chamber will air this Christmas on BBC Two