Mr. Broadbent, a developer and builder, has created "THE HOUSE OF THE FUTURE". He has filled it with gadgets such as: self lighting fire places, a self cleaning bathroom, central trash disposal units, automatic closets, hidden telephones, and his masterpiece "The Personal Ion Chamber". The house, however, has remained unsold for four years, probably because, as we see in the course of the play, most of the innovations of the future fail to work properly.
He has, at last found prospective buyers, Fred and Gladys McNicoll, and invites them to stay in the house. He is determined to offload this huge "White Elephant". He bribes two members of his staff, Casey Cody and Ben Adams, to pose as a married couple, who are renting the house. They are to extol its virtues and explain how everything works. He is pulling out all the stops. The fridge is full of expensive wine and he has hired a chef to prepare a gourmet meal. Unknown to the McNicolls', he even has his maintenance man Eddie Cott on hand to make running repairs. He thinks he has all the bases covered.
When Gladys hears Casey refer to Mr. Cott by name, the cat seems to be out of the bag, but Casey quickly recovers by saying she didn't say "Mister Cott" but "Ms Turcotte", the children's nanny. Eddie Cott now spends the rest of the play as Nanny Turcotte. A surprise visitor, Mr. Brooks, takes an almost insane fancy to "Nanny" who now has to defend 'her' honor, as well as fix the gadgets, all of which, without exception, misbehave.