The Rats in the Walls
Project Overview
An American industrialist buys his old family estate in England, Exham Priory, and begins the painstaking work of restoring it. Meanwhile, a Boston journalist arrives to document the rebuilding and to uncover the history of the Delapore family.
Then… strange things begin to happen.
Can you hear it? Can you hear the rats in the walls?
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A wealthy American industrialist from Virginia, moved to Massachusetts at age 8. Speaks with a faint Southern accent, though his years among “Yankees” show through. Type-A, domineering, used to getting his way. Haunted by the loss of his son Alfred, his grief feeds a growing instability. He carries a bitter grudge over the Civil War’s destruction of his family’s fortune. Bluster with moments of real vulnerability.
- american (new york)
- american
- male senior
- american (southern)
AMBROSE (hesitant, grief under the surface): Yes, Alfred… (slight pause) my son. He wrote to me about the Priory—about learning it had belonged to our ancestors. He became fascinated with our history, macabre stories and all. Truth be told, I had little knowledge of our line. There were some family documents once, but they were destroyed when the Yankees burned down our plantation, Carfax.
AMBROSE (hoarse, trembling): Christ! Not again… not again… Damn them, they’re in the walls… I can hear them.
AMBROSE (mad, panting, insane): me of a hideous thing, but they must know that I did not do it. They must know it was the rats; the slithering, scurrying rats whose scampering will never let me sleep; the daemon rats that race behind the padding in this room and beckon me down to greater horrors than I have ever known; the rats they can never hear; the rats, the rats in the walls.
A genial, plump country gentleman in the mold of a young Hugh Grant. Former Royal Flying Corps officer in the Great War. Resides on the neighboring estate to Exham Priory, Shropshire. Somewhat sycophantic toward Ambrose, though good-hearted and affable.
- male adult
- aristocratic british
- british
EDDIE (thoughtful; begins): Walter de la Poer, the eleventh baron. In the reign of James the First, he butchered his household in their sleep, sparing only four servants. Father, three brothers, two sisters, slaughtered. He was brought before the magistrates, but the evidence was plain, and the locals… they cheered him. Called it just. (lowers voice) Said he had rid the countryside of a blight. He fled England, crossed the ocean, and built a new life in America.
EDDIE (playful): Gladly. Though I should warn you, I’ve been known to let a lady stumble if it wins me her hand.
EDDIE (cheerful, to change the mood): Well! Miss Grant, if you wish it, I’ll show you the grounds later. The old stones look kinder in the sunlight. There are fine views from the cliff edge.
A plucky, no-nonsense reporter from the Boston Journal-American. Mid-Atlantic accent with a trace of Boston. Inspired by Rosalind Russell in His Girl Friday. Sharp-tongued, ambitious, and unwilling to be dismissed in a male-dominated field.
- female adult
- mid atlantic
- american
MURIEL (deferential but persistent): I promise my story will be… tasteful. But you can’t blame me for mentioning the Priory’s reputation. It’s the kind of colour my readers devour.
MURIEL (musing, with a dry half-smile): For all his reputation as a hard man of industry, he can’t be entirely unkind—Shadow wouldn’t have chosen him otherwise.
MURIEL (afraid, corridor in the middle of the night) Hello... ... Ambrose? Eddie?... *heavy breathing* .... Is someone there?
The expedition’s “psychic investigator.” Effete, theatrical, and prone to melodramatic pronouncements. Inspired by Roddy McDowell in The Legend of Hell House.
- male adult
- aristocratic british
- british
(airy, detached): “No, Miss Grant… you mistake me for another. A charlatan, who called himself Thorn-don. Houdini positively eviscerated the fellow. Not that I see why Houdini has any right to cast stones. You know, that's not even his real name… it’s Weisz. A stage conjurer hiding behind an alias. Rather rich, don’t you think?”
(leaning in, voice low but weighted): “Mr. Delopore… you have been shown the thing which certain forces desired you to see. This was not a mere chance. Now… now we must discover why.”
(near-hysterical, a scream then fury): “Enough! Can’t you feel it? They’re all around us! Spirits pressing in, clawing at the walls! We are trespassers here—every breath is an invitation to our doom!”
Narration in the style of Bob Danvers-Walker (“The Voice of British Pathé”). Provides historical or contextual framing.
- american
- british
- male adult
NEWSREEL VOICE (bright): From Shropshire (Pronounced: Shrop-sher) in the rolling hills of the Welsh Marches comes a story to stir the imagination! The ruins of Exham Priory, long abandoned and steeped in shadowy legend, are reborn in splendid style!
NEWSREEL VOICE: Purchased by American millionaire industrialist Mr. Ambrose Delopore, the ancient pile has undergone a stupendous restoration! Wholly new interiors, raised upon the bones of history itself, breathe fresh life into walls not trod by man since the days of King James the First.
NEWSREEL VOICE (cheerful, with a hint of irony): Of course, the locals whisper of darker things… of legends and tragedies that befell the cursed line of de la Poer (Day-law-Poor) centuries past. (Bright) But superstition, surely, has no place in the new modern England! What once was ruin is now rebirth. Exham Priory is alive again!
Ambrose’s son and only heir. Mid-Atlantic accent, upper-class refinement. His death in the aftermath of the Great War is the central wound haunting Ambrose.
- male adult
- mid atlantic
- american
*Say something you think would fit*
ALFRED (quiet, resigned, slow ghostly): That’s the herd. Ugly, flabby beasts… Good for nothing but eating. He drives them always.
ALFRED (with a faint, bitter amusement, slow ghostly): Pigs? No… Swine. That’s the swineherder. Watch.
![lost alice side-stories fandub (long term roles+soft reboot) [deadline may 20th]](https://images.castingcall.club/project_images/image-1207600-bab60841174e3fe79dd49b498e875ddc_fgraphic.png)
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