[3][4] It features a set of Russian romances written by Bella Akhmadulina, Marina Tsvetaeva and Eldar Ryazanov, composed by Andrey Petrov and Nina Shatskaya and performed by Valentina Ponomaryova.

She has sunk into poverty since her husband's death, but tries to do everything possible to improve the lives of her daughters, which means helping them to happily marry rich and noble men.

Because of her lack of money, Ogudalova keeps her house open to strangers, hoping that the company of her three beautiful music-loving daughters will attract many single and rich men who could marry the girls.

However, it soon becomes clear that Anna's husband was caught cheating in cards, and Kharita Ignatyevna is forced to humble herself in order to get money to send to her daughter.

"Dowerless" remains the youngest daughter Larisa, for whom the richest merchant in Bryakhimov, Mokiy Parmenovich Knurov, has amorous feelings.

But he is aged and already married which makes him ineligible as a groom, nevertheless Kharita Ignatyevna uses his infatuation with her daughter to receive money and expensive gifts.

Another suitor is a young successful businessman and childhood friend of Larisa, Vasiliy Danilovich Vozhevatov, quite rich, but not quite enough to afford to marry a woman with no dowry.

It seems as though Sergei Sergeevich will ask for her hand in marriage, but then he unexpectedly hurries away from the city – to save his fortune, he says, which was squandered by unscrupulous stewards.

But one day Gulyaev, who is yet another rich candidate for the role of a groom, is arrested in the house of the Ogudalovs, it turns out that he is not a Moscow banker, but a bank cashier who escaped with money.

The dinner goes terribly wrong: with the help of Paratov's friend, drunkard Arkady Schastlivtsev (aka Robinson), the groom gets heavily inebriated and embarrasses himself.

Paratov, who hid his forthcoming marriage from the Ogudalovs, tells Larisa about his love, about his readiness to leave everything for her and invites her on the steamer "Swallow", where Vozhevatov will give a banquet in honor of his acquisition.

Despite attempts of her aunt and Kharita Ignatyevna to stop him, he rushes in pursuit, taking with him a loaded pistol, but does not have time to board the steamer and ends up following it by boat.