Summer's Lease by John Mortimer

Set in Siena,
Mondano-in-Chianti
(Toscana)
 ©1988
 
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BIO
JOHN MORTIMER is a playwright, novelist, and former practicing barrister. During the Second World War he worked with the Crown Film Unit and published several novels before turning to theater. Some of his novels, including 'Summer's Lease' have been successful television series. He lives with his wife in Oxfordshire, England.
John Mortimer

Summer's Lease

JACKET NOTES:  The villa near a small Tuscan town is everything the Pargeter family could want for three-week stay--complete with a pool, magnificent views, and "the world's greatest small painting" nearby. But when the water supply fails and a neighbor dies suddenly, the idyll turns sour. And Molly Pargeter begins to wonder about their mysterious absentee landlord ...
(©Penguin Books)

DVD Description: A family vacation in Tuscany leads to intrigue and mystery in a Masterpiece Theatre presentation written by John Mortimer (Rumpole of the Bailey) and starring Sir John Gielgud in an Emmy Award(r)-winning role.

The minute she sets eyes on it, Molly Pargeter (Susan Fleetwood) knows that the Tuscan villa she has found to lease is perfect for her family's summer holiday. She is powerfully drawn to its rustic beauty and to the enigma of its absentee landlord. Never mind that her husband and teenaged daughter are vocally unenthusiastic and that her outrageously extroverted father (Sir John Gielgud) tricks them into taking him along.

As the family goes sightseeing and gathers for candlelit dinners on the terrace, Molly becomes increasingly obsessed with unraveling the secrets of the villa's owner and of the British expatriates and locals they encounter. Her father lends a hand with the sleuthing while remaining on the prowl, zeroing in on a certain rich widow with whom he shares a romantic past.