The story concerns a naive old-fashioned bachelor, teased by a pretend spinster, with a younger couple serving as competition.

It was staged by Ira Hards, and starred Burke, with Alfred Lunt, Frances Howard, and Glen Hunter.

Lead Supporting Featured The humor revolves around the complicated family relationship, which is only partially revealed during the course of the play, and the competition between Isabel and Florence.

William Ames was on a vacation when he was stranded at an isolated station north of Utica, New York, by a storm that washed out a bridge and communication lines.

Isabel shared her lunch with Ames, but the Station Master confirms there is no prospect of further food, nor any information on when the railway will resume operation.

But Florence arrives in a burst of energy; she had Johnnie drive her forty miles at night to pick up Isabel at the station.

Isabel uses the break to buffalo Ames by showing him a lot of old family daguerrotypes and implying she knew the folks in them personnally.

[fn 2] But Johnnie has gotten wise, and when Isabel feigns a lame foot, he pointedly puts slippers on her feet.

(Curtain) Booth Tarkington originally wrote the play for Maude Adams' return to acting, but she changed her mind.

Burke at the time had been married to Florenz Ziegfeld for seven years; what part this played in the producers' decision to use her is unknown.

[8] According to one account, Billie Burke had been asked by the producers where she would like the first performance to be held, and she replied "Why, my home town, Washington".

Percy Hammond in the New-York Tribune thought it "a generous comedy", an "atonement" for Tarkington's The Wren,[9] which despite Helen Hayes and Leslie Howard, had flopped the previous week.

He felt the play didn't live up to the promise of the first act, and despite a good effort, Billie Burke was miscast for a role that required her to dampen her natural "Spring-like" personna.

[19] James Whittaker in the New York Daily News said the play's appeal was limited to Burke's blue eyes, for the mystery of her character's age could hardly be considered a plot.

[22] An intercollegiate sorority of red-headed college girls elected Burke honorary chairman of their association, to which she responded with a block of free matinee tickets for their membership.