The Scapegoat

John Standing, newly unemployed, meets his doppelgänger Johnny Spence in a hotel. Spence goads him into drinking, steering him toward a reckless night. The next morning Standing wakes up without his clothes or wallet, and Spence has vanished.

George, the chauffeur to the Spence family, collects Standing and drives him to the family's grand home. Standing struggles to explain who he is and why he resembles Spence, creating early confusion. He is quickly drawn into the family's social circle and business affairs, whether he likes it or not.

Standing becomes entangled with Spence's wife, mother, sister, daughter Piglet, and two mistresses (Nina and Bela). He is pressed into managing Spence's faltering glass business while navigating jealousies and loyalties. The arrangement pulls him deeper into a web of family and power.

With the glass business faltering, Standing pretends to have signed a contract with a major customer to delay the collapse. The ruse buys time but increases risk of exposure and further manipulation from Spence and others. He must balance appearances with reality as the pressure mounts.

Standing learns the only funds to save the business lie in a trust belonging to Spence's neglected wife, Frances. The trust will pay out only if Frances has a male heir or if she predeceases Spence, creating a dangerous incentive for manipulation.

Spence returns to the house to retrieve his gun and discovers Standing sleeping with Frances. He immediately sees an opportunity to exploit their relationship for his own ends.

Spence manipulates Frances to take an overdose of morphine, so he can claim the trust and save the business. Frances submits to the plan, sacrificing herself for her family.

Piglet, Frances' daughter, witnesses Standing with Frances and mistakes him for her father, forcing a confrontation that escalates tensions. The misunderstanding heightens the stakes for everyone involved.

Standing rushes back to the house to find Frances barely alive and is aided by Charlotte, the carer for Spence's mother, giving her a new chance at life. The emotional toll sharpens the sense of urgency around the family crisis.

Standing confronts Spence at the glass foundry. Spence offers him a share of the money, but Standing refuses and is forced at gunpoint to exchange clothing, as Spence plans to kill him and hide the body in the foundry.

A brutal struggle ensues and Spence is killed. Standing escapes the immediate danger but is left with a dangerous secret and the possibility of being exposed for the deception he has endured.

Standing returns to the house, intending to disappear, but Charlotte has seen through him and persuades him to remain involved with the Spence family. He is pulled back into the life he briefly tried to leave behind.

In the final scene, Standing is seen with the Spence family, including a pregnant Frances, watching the Coronation on a newly acquired television set. The moment suggests a fragile, unsettled domestic stability and a future complicated by the choices previously made.