Three on a Match

Mary Keaton, Vivian Kirkwood (nee Revere), and Ruth Westcott have just run into one another for the first time since graduating from Public School 62 a decade ago, and in their re-acquaintance they renew their friendship. Their lives are going much as predicted when they were at school: Mary, the troublemaker who almost didn't graduate with her class, spent time in a reformatory but went straight and became a showgirl. Vivian, the popular beauty with a charmed life, married wealthy, renowned lawyer Robert Kirkwood and had son Robert Jr. Ruth, the quiet, hard-working, smart one, became a stenographer. Mary's life took a positive turn since her reformatory years, but Vivian has realized that she is unhappy with her predictable life and wondered if she ever really loved Robert. Her quest for pleasure, with a blessing of sorts from Robert who doesn't want his wife, whom he still loves, to be as distant as she seems, will affect Mary as well. Their collective destinies might be foreshadowed by the old wives' tale about three sharing a single match, from which the film takes its name.