Whenever Jack Worthing (Colin Firth) slips away to London from his Hertfordshire estate, he says he is going to see his (fictitious) wayward brother Ernest. Once there, he keeps his privacy by calling himself “Ernest,” luckily so as his beloved Gwendolen (Frances O’Connor) declares she could only love an Ernest. Her cousin Algy (Rupert Everett) is the one person who knows Jack’s secret and one day he travels down to the estate, announcing himself to Jack’s attractive ward Cecily (Reese Witherspoon) as bad brother Ernest. Cecily is much taken with him and with his name, so on Jack’s return home and Gwendolen’s unexpected arrival, it becomes clear there are both too many and too few Ernests earnestly courting.