Beware those two charming, elderly ladies - especially if they offer you a glass of elderberry wine.
Credited cast: | |||
Tony Randall | ... | Mortimer Brewster | |
Boris Karloff | ... | Jonathan Brewster | |
Dorothy Stickney | ... | Abby Brewster | |
Mildred Natwick | ... | Martha Brewster | |
Tom Bosley | ... | Teddy Brewster | |
George Voskovec | ... | Dr. Herman Einstein | |
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Farrell Pelly | ... | Rev. Dr. Harper |
Dort Clark | ... | Officer Brophy | |
Nathaniel Frey | ... | Officer Klein | |
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Dodie Heath | ... | Elaine Harper (as Dody Heath) |
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Alan MacAteer | ... | Mr. Gibbs |
Ralph Dunn | ... | Lt. Rooney | |
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Edward Cullen | ... | Mr. Witherspoon (as Edward F. Cullen) |
Rest of cast listed alphabetically: | |||
James Daly | ... | Self --promoting the next episode |
Beware those two charming, elderly ladies - especially if they offer you a glass of elderberry wine.
Tony Randall ("Mortimer") is great as the nephew who returns to his family home, and to his two maiden aunts "Abby" (Dorothy Stickney") and "Martha" (Mildred Natwick) who look very much the refined, gracious, butter-wouldn't-melt type. Shortly afterwards, however, he discovers that these two elderly spinsters have a grisly secret in their basement and when his long-lost brother "Jonathan" (Boris Karloff) arrives; he discovers that this runs in the family! It hasn't quite the charm of the 1944 iteration, and the theatrical staging - and frequently annoying interventions of "Teddy" (Tom Bosley) do detract a bit from the comedy, but the principals are on good form and all in all it's quite a charming outing for Karloff, especially, who plays his menacing, comedic, part as much to camera as to his partners on the "stage". Luckily, I've never been partial to elderberry wine....