The Scapegoat

Charles Sturridge's adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's classic novel. The story of two very different men who happen to look identical. John Standing and Johnny Spence meet by chance in a railway station bar, each of them at a crossroads in their lives. Charming and charismatic Johnny wines and dines John. But when John wakes up the following morning he is alone and Johnny's chauffeur is waiting to take him home. In spite of his protests he finds himself being inexorably drawn into the other man's life. He is suddenly responsible for a crumbling house and a failing business, and is also faced with a group of women - a distraught wife, a drug addict mother, a sister who despises him, an eccentric daughter and two mistresses. John finds himself becoming intoxicated by the meaning and purpose in his life that he has missed for so long, but when Johnny returns and sees that his scapegoat is rising to the challenge rather than taking the blame as he had planned, events take a lethal turn.