[2] The painter Godfried Schalcken sees his true love, Rose, the niece of the artist Gerrit Dou, wedded by contract for a large sum of money to Vanderhausen of Rotterdam, a strange and ghostly figure.

The marriage goes ahead as agreed, and nothing is heard of Rose until she escapes some time later and returns home distraught and starving and begging for protection, but she is pursued by her ghostly husband and disappears.

On the death of Dou a melancholy Schalcken lingers in the church after the funeral service, where a terrifying encounter with his former love leaves his senses reeling.

[4] When Megahey was offered the opportunity to oversee Omnibus, the BBC’s long-running arts documentary series, he accepted on condition that he could make Schalcken the Painter.

[2] The actor Vincent Price was initially considered for the Narrator but it was decided his voice would be "too camp", and Peter Cushing turned down the role as being too dark.