Change of Address story
Over the protests of his wife Elsa, Keith Hollin rents a beach house. Elsa dislikes the house and is disturbed by her husband's digging of a grave-like hole in the basement. She is further disturbed when she finds out that Keith is seeing a local girl named Rachel. When Keith tells Elsa that he wants to buy the house, she decides to foil his plan by contacting the wife of the current owner to tell her to not to sell. Keith, however, grows angry and kills Elsa. He buries her body in the basement, but is surprised when the police arrive. The police carry shovels and want to dig up the basement. The police tell Keith that Elsa discovered the wife of the house's owner was missing. She tipped off the police and they began an investigation. They called the house's owner in for questioning and he confessed to murdering his wife. He told them that he buried his wife in the basement of the beach house. The police are at the beach house to dig up the basement so that they can find the body. Directed by: David Friedkin. Story by: Andrew Benedict (story), Morton S. Fine, David Friedkin (teleplay).
10 total · 1 choice · 8 major · 1 minor
| Theme | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| spouse murder | choice | Keith Hollin killed his wife, Elsa, and hid her corpse under the cement in the basement in his new beach house. He was rather quickly found out, however, because Elsa had just alarmed the police to the fact that the previous owner had done the very same thing to his own wife. |
| coping with aging | major | The reason for Keith's philandering as well as his hatred of his ageing wife, it is made clear, is that he couldn't stand the thought that he himself was getting old. He also obsessed about eating healthily and exercising. |
| disintegrating romantic relationship | major | Keith and Elsa's marriage was falling to pieces during the course of the story, although it was probably unraveling even at the onset. |
| extramarital affair | major | Keith was a serial philanderer who had pursued several pretty young women behind his wife's back. |
| feeling tied down in a relationship | major | Keith Hollin had had enough of his aging wife and took measure to be with a younger woman. |
| how to murder someone and get away with it | major | The traditional way of murdering a spouse and burying them in the basement was featured in conjunction with some discussion about how to forward their mail. |
| husband and wife | major | Keith and Elsa Hollin moved to a new beachfront property against Elsa's wishes. It all went downhill from there. |
| ironic twist of fate | major | After Keith killed Elsa and buried her body in the basement, ironically, Elsa herself became the instrument of Keith's undoing since she had recently alerted the authorities to the fact that the previous owner had done the very same thing to his own wife. Thus the police arrived and found two corpses, or so is the hanging implication at the end. |
| young and old romance | major | Keith, an on-in-years man, took up with the young, habitually bikini-clad woman Rachel soon after he and his wife took up residence at the beachfront house. |
| law enforcement | minor | The police arrived to dig up Keith's basement. |