While on a speaking tour in Ohio, opinionated and arrogant radio personality Sheridan Whiteside (Monty Woolley) injures himself slipping on ice and becomes an unexpected houseguest for a prominent area family, the Stanleys. Whiteside proceeds to make brash proclamations and offer his unsolicited advice to the family members. When a romance begins between Whiteside’s assistant, Maggie Cutler (Bette Davis), and a local reporter, Bert Jefferson (Richard Travis), he interferes with that as well.