New podcast investigates murder of actor Hugh Dancy’s great-grandmother
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“Hannibal” actor Hugh Dancy has stepped out of the realm of fiction and into his own family history to contribute to his brother-in-law’s new true crime podcast.
“Ghost Story,” which premiered Oct. 22, tells the story of Dancy’s own great-grandmother, Naomi Dancy, who was mysteriously murdered in 1937, per CNN.
Hosted by journalist Tristan Redman, who is married to Dancy’s sister, Kate, the podcast is part true crime, part paranormal thriller. Its investigation is twofold: How did Naomi Dancy really die? And is her ghost haunting the house next door to the scene of the crime — the very house where Redman grew up?
How did Naomi Dancy die?
Naomi Dancy was a doctor living in London with her husband and children at the time of her death. Her brother, Maurice Tribe, was living with the family after his time serving in World War I left him with shrapnel in his brain and a missing eye, per the podcast.
On Nov. 23, 1937, Naomi was killed when Tribe shot her twice in the face, per The National Archives. Naomi’s husband, John Dancy, said in a police statement that Tribe attempted to kill him, too, according to the podcast. John Dancy told police Tribe then locked himself in an upstairs bathroom and slit his throat.
Police classified the case as a murder-suicide, and the story was largely forgotten by the Dancys. Jonathan Dancy, Redman’s father-in-law, said in the podcast that he didn’t know the story of his grandmother’s murder until he was older, and Redman’s wife, Kate, said she only learned Naomi’s name because of the podcast.
How did the ‘Ghost Story’ podcast come to be?
Redman says in the podcast that he never believed in ghosts, but that strange experiences he had growing up in his childhood home made him reconsider the existence of the paranormal. In the first episode, “The House Next Door,” he recalls objects mysteriously moving around his room and lights flickering on and off.
Redman later learned that other families who had lived in the same house had similar experiences, including one who saw the ghost of a faceless woman. When Redman learned that his wife’s great-grandmother had lived and died in the house next door, he began to doubt that it was a coincidence.
“Did we end up married because this ghost wants me to solve a murder that everyone’s been getting wrong for a century?” Redman asks his wife in the first episode.
Although the official story was always that Tribe had killed Naomi Dancy and then himself, Redman has uncovered information that he says raises questions about the possibility of Dancy’s husband murdering the two.
Actor Hugh Dancy does not appear until the podcast’s second episode, when he reads John Dancy’s police statement from the night Naomi died and speaks about his own understanding of the story.
“Ghost Story” will have a total of seven episodes. The first two are available now on all podcast platforms and all are available immediately on Wondery.
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