Obviously fleshed out from a play-script. Act 1 Country House, 2, Barber
shop in Knightsbridge, 3, Country House. This time the old nannie is chief
trouble-maker and flywheel for the plot. Mrs Price, something of a drunk,
sister of Slingsby the butler, had been nannie to the fifth Earl of
Droitwich and is mother of Syd who runs a successful hair-dressing
establishment in Knightsbridge. Or is it the other way round? Was there a
cradle-swap? Is cockney Syd the rightful earl and charming aristo Tony the
rightful barber? Ma Price knows the answer and Tony's relatives have,
behind Tony's back, bribed and pensioned her to keep her mouth shut. But
alcohol opens it and Syd is going to take his case - backed by a strong
likeness to one of the early earls in the portrait gallery - to the House
of Lords. Tony is happy enough to lose the earldom because it will free him
of his engagement to Violet, haughty daughter and heiress of Waddington's
Ninety-Seven Soups. He has fallen in love with sweet Polly Brown, American,
manicurist in Price's Hygienic Toilet Saloon of Mott Street, Knightsbridge.
Well, who is the fifth earl of Droitwich today? And who's the countess? And
who's making a million out of Price's newly patented Derma Vitalis Hair
Tonic?
Source: Richard Usborne. Plum Sauce. A P G Wodehouse Companion.