Lloyd Webber says he called priest to get rid of phantom in house

As poltergeists generally go, it seems the award-winning Andrew Lloyd Webber may have got off lightly.

- Caroline Davies

The musical theatre impresario, whose West End hits include Phantom of the Opera, has claimed he once shared his home with a poltergeist in Eaton Square.

As traditionally depicted, poltergeists the word derives from the German poltern, to crash about - are noisy or troublesome spirits associated with making loud noises and moving objects, and are capable of pinching, biting and hitting.

But it seems Lord Lloyd-Webber's paranormal housemate was of a gentler persuasion.

Asked by the Telegraph whether any of the theatres he owned were haunted, he replied he had never seen a ghost, but added: "I did have a house in Eaton Square which had a poltergeist. It would do things like take theatre scripts and put them in a neat pile in some obscure room. In the end we had to get a priest to come and bless it, and it left."