Snobby TV star, Robert Jordan, worries that he is out of touch with the younger generation and that's why his TV show is failing. He becomes a Boy Scout leader in an effort to "get in touch." Overnight hikes and other adventures follow, all centered around one small boy who takes a liking to the old curmudgeon.

Virginia, who studies at a boarding school for upper-class girls, falls in love with a medical intern who works as a waiter for a living. Both the director of the school and her mother oppose such a relationship.

David gives his wife, Joyce, an unexpected—and unpleasant—surprise when he suddenly demands a divorce. When she then learns that David has taken up with a younger woman, Joyce decides to make the most of this separation by taking a solo trip to the Caribbean. However, just before diving into a vacation fling, she runs into Emily, an old chum whose own divorce has left her embittered. Joyce then debates giving married life one last chance.

King Louis XI masquerades as a commoner in Paris, seeking out the treachery he is sure lurks in his kingdom. At a local tavern, he overhears the brash poet François Villon extolling why he would be a better king. Annoyed yet intrigued, the King bestows on Villon the title of Grand Constable. Soon Villon begins work and falls for a lovely lady-in-waiting, but then must flee execution when the King turns on him.

Jane Fonda narrates the story of the years between the ascent of talkies until late in 1934, when the Hays Office cracked down on what it perceived as immorality in Hollywood movies. The emphasis is on how women were portrayed, and focuses on how they were much more liberated and equal (or superior) to men, until 1935 when they once again took subservient roles to their male co-stars.

Two sisters from Indiana, the wide-eyed and innocent Mae Thorpe, and her more streetwise sister June, move into the Rolf House for Homeless Girls in New York. With June's help, Mae obtains a job as a stenographer for the scientist Joseph von Schraeder, while June gets work as a telegraph operator at Western Union.