The
story centers around a family of two sisters and an older brother and their
mates. Annie, the youngest of the three, still lives at home tending to an
elderly, bedridden mother we never see. The action begins when Sarah and Reg (Annie's older brother) arrive to give Annie the chance to escape for the weekend of rest.
When Annie tells Sarah she is going away with her sister's husband, Norman, it pretty much sets the tone for the evening: an extended family whose members simultaneously despises each other and can't get enough of each other. Norman needs desperately to be needed--by anyone. It's almost hard to blame him, too, once you meet his wife, Ruth, a career-obsessed woman. Rounding out the cast is Tom; the veterinarian neighbor whom everyone assumes is courting Annie.