A NEW supernatural drama which is expected to be the hit of the BBC’s autumn/winter schedule was largely shot on Merseyside and produced by a Liverpool based company.

Apparitions, starring Martin Shaw as a priest drawn against his will into the world of demonic possession and exorcism, was filmed around the city and at the huge abandoned seminary of St Joseph’s at Up Holland.

It was also produced by Lime Pictures in Childwall and airs for the first time tonight at 9pm on BBC1.

The series of six one hour episodes is already being hailed by the critics as being another potential award winner for writer/director Joe Ahearne, whose previous works include This Life.

“It’s been properly researched so there’ll be no projectile vomiting or heads spinning around 360 degrees or anything, but it will sometimes be a tense and shocking thriller, nevertheless,” said Mr Ahearne, who created the character of Father Jacob (Shaw) and his encounters after studying various theological works including two books written by Vatican exorcist Gabriele Amorth.

The writer, who said he developed the idea around the concept “that extreme sanctity and extreme evil were interwoven”, admitted that he is a lapsed Catholic and now an atheist.

“So what happened while working on this did nothing to rock my belief system or lack of it – although there were some strange things – what I would call coincidences – which happened while we were filming,” he explained of the tradition for dramatic productions about the paranormal to produce their own catalogue of unexplained events.

“For instance we were filming a scene in episode two in which a nun goes into a room and senses something very bad and the lights blow out. The next day I was getting out of bed and all the lights in my room blew. The same thing happened when we got to edit the scene itself.”

Mr Ahearne also discovered the day after reading about how exorcism can cause timepieces to stop that his own watch had stopped at the very time he had been reading about it.

He added: “But how many times does a watch stop during a lifetime? Out of all the times, the one occasion you’re likely to remember it happening is when its in association with something like this. That’s why I prefer to call them coincidences.”

One of the most disturbing scenes that did get to him, however, was the filming of a simulated satanic Black Mass at a deserted chapel.

“There was something about the atmosphere that it created which was truly horrible and seemed to affect everybody. Very uncomfortable. It also occurred during the heaviest rainfall of the year and helped create a feeling of true horror.”

He said thanks for sorting this and other scenes out were due to Liverpool based locations manager Kevin Jackson.

“He's an absolute champion for getting Liverpool onscreen because so many TV productions go to Manchester. He found a lot of difficult locations. For example I wanted a possessed man's flat to echo the house in The Exorcist which had an external long flight of stairs up the side. He found one.

“He even had to get permission to cause a hurricane outside the gates of the seminary and for a pig to be hurled from a tower block.

“Er, a dead pig obviously.”

Whether there is a sequel in the offing and whether it will again be filmed here was something that had yet to be decided, though.

“I think to reveal anything more would spoil it for those who want to watch until the sixth part,” he said “Just remember that the watchwords for Apparitions is that no-one is safe. I’ll say no more.”

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