Bubber is a high school student. Rose, a nurse is an alcoholic woman, more than twice his age, and the mother of his girlfriend, Shirley. Bubber and Rose begin an affair after he fixes Shirley up with his pal, Ransom. They carry on their affair under the nose of Shirley until everything comes out in the open at a drive-in movie theater. To get even with Bubber and Rose for "behaving badly", Shirley pricks a hole in Rose's diaphragm. Shirley goes on to live with her father and Bubber moves in with Rose along with his pet tiger. The diaphragm incident results in Rose getting pregnant with Bubber's baby. The couple must decide whether to keep the baby and continue their May/December romance or part ways.

With the help of the singer and dancer Dixie Leonhard, U.S. entertainer Eddie Sparks wants to bring some fun to the soldiers during World War II. Becoming a perfect team, they tour from North Africa to the Pacific to act for "the boys". Later, they continue their work, but when the author Silver gets involved into McCarthy's campaign, and is being fired by Eddie, Dixie turns away from him, too.