Accumulating money through usury and self-denial is Harpagon's passion and ostentatiously displayed purpose in life. He loves money more than his good name, honor, and dignity. His wealth is more important to him than his own children. He plans to marry his daughter Eliza off without a dowry to an aging rich man, his son Cleante to a wealthy widow – and he himself has chosen the beautiful young Mariana as his bride, regardless of the fact that his son is in love with her. And this is only the beginning of the hypocrisy, deceit, and manipulation that develops in his family and among his servants under the influence of Harpagon's miserliness...