The play centers on an elderly man obsessed with serving on juries and his son’s attempts to break the habit by confining him at home. Despite precautions the father repeatedly sneaks out or is roused by fellow jurors, whose wasp-like temper and ritualized procedures are parodied. The son stages a domestic trial and other comic set pieces in which the judge misapplies justice yet savors judicial authority; later he is mollified by feasting and becomes a boisterous, domineering figure whose antics spark disputes and a mock dance contest. Through farce it ridicules judicial venality, litigious culture, and demagogic influence.