First published in 1832, Honore de Balzac's The Purse is a charming account of artistic life in contemporary Paris. Laurence Olivier plays the young painter, Hippolyte Schinner, who falls from a step-ladder in his studio. The sound of his accident brings the beautiful Adelaide Leseigneur into his life.

This is one of the episodes of "Theater Royal", the only radio series in which Olivier starred and was first broadcast in 1952.