April in Paris

S. Winthrop Putnam - first name Sam - is the Assistant Secretary to the Assistant to the Undersecretary of State for the US State Department. He has been able to get as far as he has in his career in part because he is engaged to Marcia Sherman, the daughter of his boss Robert Sherman, the Assistant to the Undersecretary of State. The feather in his cap may be arranging the Paris Festival, an international festival highlighting the best in several areas of the performing arts. However, he makes a gaffe - sending the letter of invitation for the US theater representative who was supposed to be Ethel Barrymore to a New York chorus girl named Ethel 'Dynamite' Jackson instead - that may ruin his career, especially as Ethel Jackson has already received the invitation and is raring to go. After his initial panic, Winthrop is happy to learn that the media has picked up on the story which in turn has made Sherman come to the conclusion that sending someone from the rank and file like Miss Jackson is a stroke of genius. The trip is nothing as Ethel imagines, as it entails many lessons in refinement so that she doesn't embarrass the US government. Although Ethel and Winthrop get off to a rocky start because of many of these issues, the two fall in love. Sam, as Ethel calls Winthrop, has to decide if his love for Ethel or his career is more important. The course of true love is assisted along the way by Philippe Fouquet, a womanizing French national in the US, he, penniless, who is trying to make his way back home to Paris.