Kitty Owen Spence might have become a genteel Newport doyenne or a rarified Park Avenue wife, but, as it came to pass, she was destined to become a captivating figure in the cultural and political cavalcade of the 20th century.

Drawing on an exceptional cache of newly discovered source material, Jefferson Miller, Academy Award-winning documentarian and Kitty Owen Spence's grandson, and producer Arthur Gorson, tell the story of Kitty's singular life among the celebrated, and the luminous, culminating in her beloved High Hope, the Jamaican greathouse where she created an exotic, discreet, and sophisticated domain that was the backdrop to mysterious events that rattled geopolitical history...

Born in 1904 in New Orleans, Kitty was steeped in social privilege, wealth, and opportunity (her maternal grandfather was the illustrious politician William Jennings Bryan). She spent early years in Manhattan, and as a 16 -year-old pre-Raphaelite beauty, was idealized in artist Mayfield Parrish's famous poster, Daybreak. An adventurous life followed in Jazz Age Paris, bohemian New York, in pre-war Europe diplomatic circles, and in Wall Street society. In every setting, her restless spirit and insatiable curiosity made Kitty both an intellectual trailblazer and the life of the party.

The revelations in High Hope give an especially rich view of Kitty's life at High Hope and the intrigues conceived under its Jamaican moon. At its height in the roiling political and social cauldron of the 1960s and 70s, a fascinating and combustive confluence of world figures frequented High Hope and both frolicked and conspired. Were Marilyn Monroe, James Bond-creator Ian Fleming, and CIA superspy Richard Helms guests at Kitty's elegant table as the Bay of Pigs invasion was plotted? What were Charlie Chaplin, Noel Coward, James Garner and Jamaican Prime Minister-to be Michael Manley whispering to each other in confidence as the Perrier-Jouet was flowing? Under British spymaster William Stephenson's suave veneer, what war games were afoot?