The sole teaming of Angela Lansbury and Laurence Olivier is a giant fiasco, nothing like Angela's fun TV mystery show that was just about to start, but much like the type of hammy over-the-top braying that Olivier had been doing for a decade. She's a wheelchair bound mystery writer (not a shade, but an eclipse of what was to come) who drives her Indian servant Tariq Yunus nuts, setting the trashcan on fire with her smoking and sending him out on idiotic errands while he's preparing dinner. Auntie Maimed is instantly an extreme annoying woman, continuously chattering about nothing and an absolute bore, so when it's her daughter-in-law (Hildegard Neil) who gets murdered, not her, there in that lies the surprise.
As her old lover who shows up to cater to her latest whim when Yunus decides he's tuning her out, Olivier isn't as much an annoying character but an out of touch ham, and bellows every line as if he was shouting to the top of the Old Vic. Charles Keating adds a touch of class as Lansbury's unfortunate son, having just started his recurring long run as a dashing criminal on "Another World", underplaying in light of the older star's overplaying. The actors playing the younger characters are barely noticeable, just bland. This is the first time I've ever watched Lansbury in something where she was unbearable, and I blame that on the writing and direction which had her nearly close to Bette Davis's monster mama in "The Anniversary", sans eye patch.
As her old lover who shows up to cater to her latest whim when Yunus decides he's tuning her out, Olivier isn't as much an annoying character but an out of touch ham, and bellows every line as if he was shouting to the top of the Old Vic. Charles Keating adds a touch of class as Lansbury's unfortunate son, having just started his recurring long run as a dashing criminal on "Another World", underplaying in light of the older star's overplaying. The actors playing the younger characters are barely noticeable, just bland. This is the first time I've ever watched Lansbury in something where she was unbearable, and I blame that on the writing and direction which had her nearly close to Bette Davis's monster mama in "The Anniversary", sans eye patch.