The madcap life of eccentric Mame Dennis and her bohemian, intellectual arty clique is disrupted when her deceased brother's 10-year-old son Patrick is entrusted to her care. Rather than bow to convention, Mame introduces the boy to her free-wheeling lifestyle, instilling in him her favorite credo, "Life is a banquet, and most poor sons of bitches are starving to death." Figuring in the storyline are Agnes Gooch (Mame's personal secretary and nanny-in-law), Vera Charles (her "bosom buddy" baritone actress and world's greatest lush) and Dwight Babcock (the stuffy and officious executor of her brother's estate). Mame loses her fortune in the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and tries her hand at a number of jobs with comically disastrous results but perseveres with good humor and an irrepressible sense of style.