Although she is known as a patron of the arts, a graceful duchess nevertheless refuses her nephew to marry an enterprising actress in this German melodrama starring Kathe Dorsch and silent screen legend Henny Porten. When Philine (Hilde Krahl), the troupe's ingénue, is rejected as proper marital material by the Duchess of Weissenfels (Porten), Karoline Neuber (Dorsch) creates such a furor that she is banished from the country. A performance at the court at St. Petersburg also ends in disaster for the unhappy actress and abandoned by all, Karoline dies a suicide.

Inflamed by his readings of chivalric novels, Don Quixote, a knight with a sad face, accompanied by Sancho Panza, a peasant steeped in common sense, decides to set off across the world in search of improbable adventures.