Fifty years ago the networks would try out a series for a brief run in the summer. Some were intended to end for good at the end of the run, some would be considered for inclusion as a midseason replacement later on. I don't know what was intended for this series, but I think it was too dark a comedy to be picked up anyway.
The subject is the death of the father Jonas Paine (Malcolm Atterbury), who owns and runs a pickle factory and is bedridden expected to die at any time. His daughter Nellie (Julie Harris) has been tending him alone for 8 years, since her brother Ernie (Richard Long) left the family.
Jonas is a sly devil with some plans in mind for his children ("wonderful" the lawyer calls his children - Jonas takes a swig of hidden liquor and says "They're not that wonderful."). Nellie is all angry and put upon martyr, not just out of love of her father or of pickles. Ernie is a loud, brassy, irresponsible but jovial jerk who thinks he is God's gift to women. Ernie and Nellie never have gotten along. Jonas has one of his employees send for Ernie, who comes home to see his "dying" father, and that's when Jonas starts his manipulations, to keep Ernie back home, to keep Nellie in the house, to keep both of them taking care of him and the pickle business when all they really want is for him to die and leave them something other than the gerkins that won a prize in 1911.
Nobody is very sympathetic here and the subject of waiting for Dad to die definitely shows the series' British origins (in a program called "Nearest and Dearest). That's probably what kept the series from going more than 9 episodes. But Harris, Long and Atterbury were very very good, as they each usually were, each playing somewhat against their usual "type." Sadly, the episodes are not available anywhere I've been able to find. I'd like to see it all one more time, just for the actors.
