Plot
Ted (Chester Morris), Jerry (Norma Shearer), Paul (Conrad Nagel) and Dorothy (Helen Johnson) are part of the New York in-crowd. Jerry's decision to marry Ted crushes Paul. He gets drunk and is involved in an accident that leaves Dorothy's face disfigured. Out of pity, Paul marries Dorothy. Ted and Jerry have been married three years when she discovers he had a brief affair with another woman — and when she confronts him on their third anniversary, he tells her it didn't "mean a thing". Lonely and upset, and with Ted out on a business trip, Jerry has an affair with his best friend, Don. She shares the truth with Ted upon his return, withholding Don's name, and they argue ending with Ted leaving her and the couple filing for a divorce. While Jerry turns to partying to drown her sorrows, Ted becomes an alcoholic. Paul and Jerry run into each other and she discovers he still loves her and is willing to leave Dorothy to be with her. It is only after she meets Dorothy that Jerry is forced to evaluate her decision.
Norma Shearer won the Academy Award for Best Actress. Also starring in the film are Robert Montgomery, Conrad Nagel, and Florence Eldridge.
Read more about this topic: The Divorcee
Famous quotes containing the word plot:
“Morality for the novelist is expressed not so much in the choice of subject matter as in the plot of the narrative, which is perhaps why in our morally bewildered time novelists have often been timid about plot.”
—Jane Rule (b. 1931)
“There saw I how the secret felon wrought,
And treason labouring in the traitor’s thought,
And midwife Time the ripened plot to murder brought.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)
“We have defined a story as a narrative of events arranged in their time-sequence. A plot is also a narrative of events, the emphasis falling on causality. “The king died and then the queen died” is a story. “The king died, and then the queen died of grief” is a plot. The time sequence is preserved, but the sense of causality overshadows it.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)