ACT  I

Through the Eisenstein home floats the serenade of Alfred, a tenor still in love with his old flame Rosalinde, now the wife of Gabriel Eisenstein. Adele, a chambermaid, saunters in reading an invitation to a ball. The maid asks for the evening off to visit a “sick aunt,” a plea her mistress, Rosalinde dismisses. Alfred steps into the room and begins to woo Rosalinde. The suitor leaves as Eisenstein and his lawyer, Blind arrive.  Eisenstein has been sentenced to a week in jail for a civil offense. No sooner does he dismiss the incompetent advocate than his friend Falke comes to invite Eisenstein to a ball, suggesting he bring along his repeater stop-watch, which charms all the ladies. Rosalinde joins Adele in a bittersweet farewell to Eisenstein before he goes off to prison. Sending Adele to her “aunt,” Rosalinde receives the ardent Alfred. Their theatre is interrupted by the warden Frank. Rosalinde persuades Alfred to save her name by posing as her husband, and Frank carts him off to jail.

ACT  II

At the palace of Prince Orlofsky, the nobleman’s guests, Adele and her cousin Ida among them, await the arrival of their host. Orlofsky enters, quite bored — even with Falke’s promise of a comedy of errors. Adele, dressed in one of Rosalinde’s most elegant gowns, laughs off Eisenstein’s suggestion that she resembles his wife’s chambermaid. Frank enters, and Rosalinde, also invited by Falke, arrives disguised as a temperamental Hungarian countess; she is soon wooed by her own reeling husband, whose pocket watch she steals to hold as proof of his philandering. Champagne flows, and the guests dance wildly until dawn.

ACT  III

At the prison, Frosch, a drunken jailer gets angry of Alfred’s singing. Frank arrives, still giddy with champagne, followed shortly by Ida and Adele who believes he might further her stage aspirations. Frank, hearing someone at the door, hides the girls in a cell and then admits Eisenstein, who has come to begin his sentence. He is surprised to learn his cell is already occupied by a man who claims to be Eisenstein and who was found supping with Rosalinde. No sooner is he disguised than Rosalinde hurries in to secure Alfred’s release. With her would-be paramour, she confides her flirtation to the “lawyer.” Enraged, Eisenstein removes his disguise and accuses his wife of promiscuity, at which Rosalinde whips forth the watch she took from him at the ball. Orlofsky and his guests arrive to celebrate the reconciliation of Rosalinde and Eisenstein, singing a final toast as Eisenstein is taken away.