[1] The plot of When Dreams Comes True centers around the playboy Kean Hedges who has recently been disinherited by his millionaire father after pursuing a scandalous relationship with a chorus girl in Paris.
He is forced to sell his possessions in order to obtain enough money to book passage back home to New York City on the transatlantic steamship Kaiser; barely scraping together enough to pay for accommodations in steerage among the lowest class passengers.
Now penniless, he falls in love with his "dream girl" from afar, a first class passenger named Beth, but can not bring himself to her attention for fear that his reduced circumstances will invite her scorn.
Upon returning to New York City he sets out to reform his life and win back his father's approval and inheritance in order that his dreams might come true.
[1] Other cast members included Marie Flynn as Beth, May Vokes as Matilda, Anna Wheaton as Margaret Smith, Frazer Coulter as Jerome K. Hedges, Clyde Hunnewell as Griggs, Amelia Summerville as Mrs. William Smith, and Edward Garvie as Hercules Strong.