Released just three years after the stock market crash of 1929, the plot focuses on the character "Babe" Stewart (played by Gable), a card sharp and gambling cheat, and "Connie Randall", a street-wise librarian with whom he develops a relationship.

[1] Card sharp "Babe" Stewart (Clark Gable) and his cronies, Kay Everly (Dorothy Mackaill), Charlie Vane (Grant Mitchell), and Vargas (Paul Ellis), cheat an unsuspecting Mr Morton (Walter Walker) at poker.

Police officer "Dickie" Collins (J. Farrell MacDonald), who has been following Babe, then drops in to inform him that he has told Morton the truth.

To fill the daytime hours when he is supposedly at his job, he persuades a stock broker friend to let him work as his assistant.

Instead, he tells Collins to charge him with something, and, in return for a confession, he will serve 90 days in jail to pay for his past misdeeds and "come clean".

When Babe gets out of jail, he purchases some South American "souvenirs", including a caged bird, from a local shop before he comes home to Connie.

Marion Davies is ultimately responsible for this film being made, as she encouraged MGM to make a trade of Gable for Bing Crosby, who was the only person she wanted for her next project, which became Going Hollywood (1933).

[2] The original treatment of Val Lewton's 1932 novel No Bed of Her Own, which was the early working title for the film as well, was written by Austin Parker, who also wrote the first screenplay.

[3] Miriam Hopkins was originally offered the lead, but balked at the idea of Gable receiving top billing, and demanded another project.

Lombard, who was a rising star on the Paramount lot, but still relegated to roles in which she was second-billed to her male counterparts, was chosen to replace Hopkins.