Overview
Produced off-Broadway under the title "Rendezvous at Senlis." Delachume, a young man of considerable charm and no scruples, is married to a rich, hysterical wife; they live in luxury in Paris, and their worldly goods are shared by Georges' parents and his best friend Jacques, not to mention Jacques' wife Barbara, all of whom have been in comfort for years. Then into Georges' life comes Isabelle, a quiet young girl with a kind heart and none of the sophistication to which he has been accustomed for so long. Georges is swept off his feet by her simplicity, and succumbs to a longing for an uncomplicated life - shared, of course, with Isabelle. He spins stories for her about the parents and friends he would like to have, and the sort of home where he would like to ask her to dine with the family - she accepts. He must obviously reproduce this fictious background for one night, or lose Isabelle. He hires house, servants and stage parents, but his real family materalize before his dream, and Isabelle discovers the truth. Georges, after a scene with his wife in which she tries to shoot him, thinks he has lost both his present and his future. However, Isabelle's love is not the love "which alters when it alteration finds" and, as the hangers-on recognize defeat and retire one by one, Georges and Isabelle are left to a future of love and simplicity far away from Paris and its intrigues.