Pre-Code time! Spoilers ahead.
William Poster (Ricardo Cortez) is a successful and infamous gossip columnist constantly being sued for what the secrets he prints about the wealthy and the celebrities within the city. He feels they’ve lived scandalous lives without repercussions long enough. He also tries to get charities started for the forgotten famous, older women who are destitute and used to be the toast of the town. Poster’s fiancee Peggy (Helen Twelvetrees) acts as his inside man, using her status as a stage star to get the dirt on everyone else. She informs him of the beautiful heiress Mildred Huntington (Jill Esmond) is escaping from her recently broken engagement by taking a cruise to Europe.
Poster tracks down Mildred on the ship (after peeking lots of first class windows to see if there’s any other stories he can dig up) and they start an affair back in New York. Meanwhile, Poster and Peggy are witnesses to a murder in a speakeasy and threatened by the Italian bartender/murderer. Being the idiot he is, Poster prints the story of the murder. A terrified Peggy objects, saying that “something terrible might happen.” Poster tells her, “If it does, I’ll print it.” In her nervousness, Peggy’s engagement ring slips off. Poster takes it in order to have the stone reset.
In the midst of the death threats and giving his girl anxiety, Poster continues his affair with Mildred. Then she finds Peggy’s engagement ring and assumes it’s for her. Poster doesn’t argue and let’s her have the ring. WHAT A CAD! Peggy sees Mildred wearing her ring and reads in the paper that they are engaged. Also, Mildred realizes that he’s only with her to get secrets on all of her friends to print in his paper. Mildred breaks off the engagement and Peggy goes to Poster’s rival paper with the story of his two-timing.
While Poster and his rival newspaper man Maloney are getting drunk off bootleg liquor that Poster keeps in his water cooler, he talks about his regret over Peggy and how he doesn’t blame her for leaving. Maloney had once said to him that he never wanted to be as famous as Poster because he wanted to keep some integrity. As Maloney leaves, the Italian bartender shows up and shoots Poster. Peggy, who was in the building talking to the switchboard operator, gets him in time and his life is saved. Fittingly, Maloney scoops Poster on the story of his own shooting.
This is a movie about what is the ethical code of a writer. Writers can have sympathy and imagination, but not always empathy.
