An investigation of how Hollywood's fabled stories have deeply influenced how Americans feel about transgender people, and how transgender people have been taught to feel about themselves.

Young Janet Osborn finds herself stuck in a loveless marriage, her only source of pleasure being her daughter. Janet has always dreamed of a career on the stage, but never had the chance. One day she meets Geoffrey Allen, a theatrical agent, and decides to try her luck at becoming an actress. However, when her husband Mark finds out, he orders her out of the house and keeps their daughter, Marcia. Moreover, her acting career sputters to a halt, and Geoffrey Allen takes advantage of her situation to make her his mistress. Years later she finds out that Marcia has become an actress--and that she, too, has become involved with Geoffrey.

John Morrison, Wall Street financier, is in the habit of bringing home to his wife daily a bunch of beautiful roses. Delevan, a recognized Money King, meets Helen, the financier's daughter, upon whom he seems to immediately exert a hypnotic influence. She becomes infatuated with him.

Tupper meets the wealthy Miss Whipple at a baseball game. When she declares that she just adores baseball players, Tupper starts up a team.

Lillian Travers, a New York heiress, pops down to Florida to surprise her fiancé, Fred Cassadene, the house doctor at a prominent Saint Augustine hotel. The surprise, however, is Lillian's when she finds Fred in a series of compromising situations with a certain wealthy widow staying there. When she can take no more, Lillian discovers a box forgotten at an old curiosity shop in which lies a hundred-year-old secret: a vial of four rare and exotic African seeds that promises to transform whoever swallows one from a woman to a man or vice versa.

An old maid vies with a beautiful young student for the affections of an elderly professor.

Though her father forbids her to marry Jack Harvey, a poor young artist, Molly Wilson becomes his wife and goes away with him to another town. Bessie, the eldest daughter, an attractive widow with two baby boys and a baby girl, pleads with her father in Molly's behalf, but he is obdurate.

Brought into contact with each other, Runa and Shep, a dog, become great chums. Their companionship is looked upon with evident interest and amusement by Runa's parents, who do not seem to be very greatly concerned for their daughter's childish affairs, leaving that entirely to her nurse.