Plot
The film is a morality story on the evils of marital infidelity and the wild lifestyle of New York actors. At the same time, the film included scenes of seduction and debauchery that made it the subject of controversy over its prurient content.
The film's plot centers on Adrienne Renault (played by Louise Glaum), the beautiful queen of the Midnight Follies at the Frivolity Theater.
The film opens with Renault's current conquest, a married millionaire, Philip Overman (played by William Conklin). Overman is in his private box watching Renault perform her seductive "Spider Dance." Renault comes on stage dressed as a spider, "clad in a translucent cloak of webs wrapped cloak-like around a body-hugging black sheath."
In another scene of debauchery, the film depicts a party at which "stage-door johnnies drink out of women's slippers and scantily clad chorines slide down banisters, their undergarments visible to all and sundry."
The film then shifts to Mrs. Overman (played by Myrtle Stedman), home alone in her empty mansion. Her suspicions persuade her to hire a private detective to follow her husband. Eventually, Mrs. Overman uncovers her husband's infidelity. She begs Renault to release her husband, but Renault refuses, and Mrs. Overmire obtains a divorce.
By this time, Renault has fallen in love with a new millionaire, Dick Wallace (played by Irving Cummings). Renault marries Wallace, but Wallace then betrays Renault, falling in love with Renault's young protege, Daisy (played by Viola Barry). It was Renault who had coached Daisy in the ways of seducing wealthy married men. Renault begs Daisy to release Wallace, harkening back to the scene where Mrs. Overmire had pled with Renault. As Renault had done with Mrs. Overmire, Daisy refuses to release Wallace.
Renault then sails for Europe. She ends up on the same ship with the reunited Overmans, who are on a second honeymoon. The chastened Renault does nothing to disrupt the relationship, resigned to a life of solitude. The film's final intertitle reads, "The standards of morality eternally demand that the naked soul of Sex be stripped of its falsehoods -- which can only be atoned for through bitter tears."
Read more about this topic: Sex (film)
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“Trade and the streets ensnare us,
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
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