The Way Up to Heaven story

talesoftheunexpected1x09 · 1979-05-19

Mrs. Alice Foster has a pathological fear of being late. On the day of her holiday to New York to see their daughter, her husband, an inveterate and somewhat sadistic dawdler, torments her by making her late. To her relief, the flight has been delayed by fog, so she is on time, anyway; but it is then cancelled and she is forced to catch the next flight in the morning. Mr. Foster attempts to delay her again. Sat in the car and just about to leave, he says he has forgotten a gift for their daughter and says he will go back into the house to get it. Mrs. Foster then notices the gift stuck in the car. Frantic to get to the airport on time, she runs after him to tell him she's found the gift, and sees that he has taken their in-house elevator to go upstairs. She hears him shouting her name and realises her husband is stuck in the lift. A slight smile twitches across her face. She returns to the car and tells the driver to take her to the airport. She gets her revenge on his cruelty when she returns from holiday, six weeks later, and finds that the lift has been stuck between two floors all that time, during which her husband has died of starvation and thirst. She calmly calls the Elevator Emergency Service in order to have it repaired. Directed by: Simon Langton. Story by: Roald Dahl.