Houseguest Horrors
“We spend all our time here. I want to make a paradise,” says Jennifer Lawrence of the country mansion she shares with Javier Bardem in the movie Mother!, which opens Sept. 15. So she throws herself into a top-to-bottom renovation. “She redid all of it, every last detail,” Bardem says reverently when it’s done. “She breathed life back into every room.”
Jennifer Lawrence renovates a house in “Mother!” Photo by Niko Tavernise
But then death seems to come knocking in the form of Ed Harris and Michelle Pfeiffer, who appear unexpectedly on the doorstep and are graciously ushered in. Before long, blood stains the carpet, lightbulbs shatter and walls disintegrate — and Lawrence wants the couple and their seemingly sinister associates gone.
But then death seems to come knocking in the form of Ed Harris and Michelle Pfeiffer, who appear unexpectedly on the doorstep and are graciously ushered in. Before long, blood stains the carpet, lightbulbs shatter and walls disintegrate — and Lawrence wants the couple and their seemingly sinister associates gone.
Although they don’t always herald such horrors, uninvited visitors who overstay their welcome is a familiar trope on the page and on screen. In his memoir A Year in Provence, Peter Mayle writes about acquaintances of acquaintances who think nothing of imposing upon him and his wife during the renovation of their 200-year-old French farmhouse.
Share: Did visitors ever invade your home the minute the paint was dry — or, even worse, before? In the Comments below, tell us how you coped with extra people in the house during or immediately after a remodel.
Share: Did visitors ever invade your home the minute the paint was dry — or, even worse, before? In the Comments below, tell us how you coped with extra people in the house during or immediately after a remodel.
In the 1990 comedy Madhouse, John Larroquette and Kirstie Alley get a surprise visit from a cousin and his pregnant wife. When an accident leaves the expectant mom bedridden, a few days turns into half a year.
Tell us: Have you ever invited someone for a brief stay, only to have it get extended again and again … and again? What were the circumstances and how were they resolved? Or is the person still there?
Grasscloth wallcovering: Phillip Jeffries; see similar wallcoverings
Tell us: Have you ever invited someone for a brief stay, only to have it get extended again and again … and again? What were the circumstances and how were they resolved? Or is the person still there?
Grasscloth wallcovering: Phillip Jeffries; see similar wallcoverings
In a classic Saturday Night Live spoof of a shock-flick trailer, John Belushi is The Thing That Wouldn’t Leave. He settles in for a drink and a movie as his initially polite and increasingly distressed hosts, Jane Curtin and Bill Murray, fake yawns and point out that they have to be at work real early in the morning.
Your turn: Has a party guest tested the limits of your hospitality? How did you gracefully manage to finally show him or her the door?
Your turn: Has a party guest tested the limits of your hospitality? How did you gracefully manage to finally show him or her the door?