Clyde Griffiths, the son of fanatical street evangelists, was neglected by his parents and grew up hungry and poverty-stricken. He now works as bellhop “number seven” in the Green-Davison Hotel in Kansas City. Although he longs to be accepted into society, he reluctantly dates a maid at the hotel. One night Clyde is involved in an accident in which a fellow employee, who is driving drunk, hits a little girl and kills her. Clyde and his friends flee the scene of the accident and Clyde, fearing he will be arrested, leaves town. Following a series of odd jobs, Clyde, now twenty, gets a job as a bellboy in a large Chicago hotel. His wealthy uncle, Samuel Griffiths, who is a guest in the hotel, then gets him a job in his shirt factory in Lycurgus, New York. Following an apprenticeship, Clyde becomes foreman of the collar stamping department, which employs only young women, but he is forbidden from fraternizing with the workers. Ignored by his uncle’s socially-conscious family and longing for companionship with a woman, Clyde is quickly smitten by a new factory worker named Roberta Alden. Breaking the rules, Clyde and “Bert” have a secret love affair in the spring and summer, spending their week-ends outdoors. When winter comes, Clyde pleads with Bert to allow him to meet with her in her room, and seduces her. Meanwhile, Clyde has met Sondra Finchley, a beautiful debutante. As the weeks pass, Clyde ignores Bert and falls in love with Sondra. When Bert discovers she is pregnant, she pleads with Clyde to marry her, but he suggests she return to her parents’ farm, promising he will marry her later. In the summer, Sondra invites Clyde to secretly join her at a week-end party and promises to marry him when she comes of age in October. After reading a newspaper article about the accidental drowning of a couple, Clyde contemplates drowning Bert then invites her to spend a week-end in the Adirondacks, where they will marry. While out on a lake in a canoe, Clyde confesses that he brought Bert to the lake to drown her, but has suddenly decided to marry her. Bert, confused, stands up and shakes Clyde, and by doing so, overturns the boat. As Bert screams for help, Clyde swims to shore and allows her to drown. Some time later, Clyde’s room is searched by the police, and love letters from Bert that mention Sondra Finchley are found. At Sondra’s camping party, Clyde is arrested and charged with Bert’s murder. Throughout a nationally publicized, lengthy trial, Clyde maintains that he is innocent. Despite his attorneys’ attempts to convince the jury that Clyde’s “change of heart” in the boat removes him from guilt, Clyde is convicted of first-degree murder, and is sentenced to die by the electric chair within ten days. After Clyde is placed in a cell, his mother, who was flown to the trial by a newspaper to act as a reporter, pleads with Clyde to tell her the truth about the murder, and he admits that, although he did not kill Bert, he could have saved her but didn’t because he wanted her dead. His mother blames herself for bringing Clyde up among evil, dirty surroundings, admitting that while she and his father were trying to save the souls of others, they let Clyde go astray. After telling Clyde to face his punishment “like a man,” Mrs. Griffiths tells him that someday, somewhere, he will be given the right start and embraces her son through the prison bars. More on Wikipedia
Watch An American Tragedy (1931)
