Alan Bennett sits in a room at the Crown Hotel, Harrogate, and works out that he and his brother (born on the same day, three years apart) must have been conceived during the August Bank Holiday, but probably not in a hotel like this. In the past, staying in hotels used to be humiliating. His impoverished parents would take him to cafés and feed him cake brought from home, all the time fearing discovery and expulsion. This instinctive fear stayed with him until his twenties.
But the Crown isn't intimidating - it's a perfect vantage point for observing a wide range of characters. A woman complains that Country Life is dull, but her companion says that that's deliberate. An elderly man pick racing prospects with his wife - romantically, he opts for a horse called A Very Special Lady. Bennett wonders how to define their social class - his mother would have called them "a grand couple".
As people check in, Bennett reflects on tipping - he recalls his father's inability to time tips correctly, often handing one over mid-demonstration. His parents would always be relieved once they had the room to themselves - they'd bluffed their way into the enemy camp, and would take great delight in exploring the facilities.
Back in the foyer, Bennett looks at the agenda, which includes Dr Barnardo's Fashion Show, a presentation about hormonal contraceptives, and a meeting of the Institute of Explosives Engineers. Manageresses of roadside eateries discuss sewage with a man from head office. The newly elected Chairman of the Institution of Environmental Health Officers says that this elevation is the high point of his life. Five-year-olds watch a conjuror, and the inhabitants of a nursing home have a tea party. Watching the Boston Spa Tennis Club's annual disco, Bennett reflects on the charms of the zimmer frame.
The next morning, Bennett has a cooked breakfast - he once assumed everyone did so outside his own family. He believes hotels are designed to be one step behind the times - like the colonies, keeping up a way of life that is already outmoded.
Managers attend a meeting about how to hold meetings. The Harrogate Flower Show Committee meets the Mayor and other local dignitaries. Road hauliers' wives have a get-together, and Bennett wonders how they met their husbands. The Mayor entertains fellow mayors and delegates from Harrogate's twin town in France, the mayor of which is having a one-sided conversation (in French) with the wife of the President of the North of England Horticultural Society. She tells him she's glad he came. A wedding party sees the bride and groom drinking champagne from glass slippers - a hotel tradition.
Bennett reminisces about having dinner at noon - anything after that was considered a snack. His father would refuse the wine list in restaurants, as wine doesn't go with spaghetti on toast. As Bennett grew older, he came to delight in these eccentricities - while his parents struggled to fulfil what they thought were his aspirations for them, he wanted them to stay the same.
A meeting of TV rental representatives illustrates the lack of social class in today's hotel culture. Bennett's snobbish side regrets this, but it's a small regret - nowadays one can order poached eggs while wearing jeans. He started the film hoping to revive and relocate earlier embarrassments, but failed - he's got older, and he knows that these things don't matter any more.
On the train journey back to London, a ticket collector informs him that his supplement does not qualify him to travel in the first-class compartment.
