Alexander is the second contender for the Russian throne. He doesn’t want to be emperor, especially since his older brother Nikolai will soon take this place. Therefore, Alexander, without thinking about anything, spends all his days in festivities, games and meetings with the maid of honor of the Empress Marie Meshcherskaya. Brother Nikolai, meanwhile, goes to Denmark to meet his future wife, the Danish Princess Mary. But fate has its own way: Nikolai dies, having managed to join the hands of Alexander and Maria on his deathbed. And now Alexander faces a difficult choice - to ascend the throne he hates by marrying an unloved woman, or to evade duty by escaping from Meshcherskaya, and thereby disgrace the honor of the Russian throne.