Jo and Peter have moved to the country to allow Peter to pursue a career as a rural vet. Jo is pregnant, and is having to contend with ongoing construction in the house and a cat that has been spooked by their new home. However, when something nasty is discovered inside a wall in the kitchen, things take a ghoulish turn for the worse.
Fairly unimaginative take on themes of birth, death and centuries old curses is rendered practically unwatchable by pedestrian direction and awful acting. The entire production is shot like a bad stage play, with the actors telegraphing everything to the back row, even when in close up. Wymark is best of the bunch as the unsettled mum-to-be, struggling with increasing unease, insensitive builders, wayward cat and unsympathetic husband-from-hell, although it's astounding Jo doesn't just crack Peter over the head with the mystery pot they find bricked up in the wall. McKenna is a little OTT as Peter's boss, booming his lack of subtlety all over the set without a thought for the poor viewer, but what makes this so awful is MacCorkindale. His Peter begins as cross and deeply unsympathetic and has nowhere to go but angrier, shoutier, more uncaring and more patronizing as things progress. Nelson mustn't have heard of 'less is more', sadly, and by the end of the piece it's MacCorkindale you'd like to see shoved in a pot and walled up in the kitchen! Fraser offers a wee bit of light relief as McKenna's 'stuff and nonsense' wife, barking advice and retorts to poor Jo, but it's nowhere near enough.
Watch this for one of the worst TV performances of 1976, but otherwise avoid!