Judy Holliday stars as Gladys Glover, a young woman who wants to make a name for herself, so she rents a billboard on Columbus Circle and advertises her name. When a wealthy soap manufacturer tries to wrestle the billboard away from Gladys he finds himself falling in love with her.

It's the off-season at the lonely Beauregard Hotel in Bournemoth, and only the long-term tenants are still in residence. Life is stirred up, however, when the beautiful Ann Shankland arrives to see her alcoholic ex-husband, John Malcolm, who is secretly engaged to Pat Cooper, the woman who runs the hotel. Meanwhile, snobbish Mrs Railton-Bell discovers that the kindly if rather doddering Major Pollock, played by David Niven, who won an Oscar for his performance, a retired officer who likes to find out more...