American couple Mike and Janet Harper move to England for Mike's work with a company that deals in textiles and fashions. Mike wants to live in a flat in the heart of London, but Janet instead finds a rural estate 30 miles outside London in Kent, and Mike must commute into the city by train. For convenience, Mike often stays in a company's flat in London rather than returning to Kent, but his absence causes Janet to feel lonely and neglected.
Janet believes that Mike may be having an affair with his assistant Claire Hackett, and the Harpers' busybody landlady Vanessa Courtwright encourages Janet to play Mike's game by entering into an affair of her own, even if it is fake. However, the affair may become a reality when the suave Italian antiques dealer Paul Bellari arrives to decorate the house. Bellari whisks Janet off to Paris, where she manages to deflect his advances despite her inebriation after drinking champagne. Eventually, Paul and Janet learn that their suspicions were false and they reconcile with each other.[4]
George Marshall was recruited to replace original director Ralph Levy, who contracted a viral disease during filming. This change caused the film to finish behind schedule.[5]
According to Fox records, the film needed to earn $7,300,000 in rentals to break even and made $5,275,000, meaning it made a loss.[7]
Novelization
In advance of the film's release, as was the custom of the era, a paperback novelization of the film was published by Dell Books. The author was renowned crime and western novelist Marvin H. Albert, who had written other books related to films to coincide with their releases.[8]
^Solomon, Aubrey (1989). Twentieth Century Fox: A Corporate and Financial History (The Scarecrow Filmmakers Series). Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press. p. 254. ISBN978-0-8108-4244-1.
