A movie star helps a young singer-actress find fame, even as age and alcoholism send his own career into a downward spiral.

Told in flashback form, the film traces the rise and fall of a tough, ambitious Hollywood producer, Jonathan Shields, as seen through the eyes of various acquaintances, including a writer, James Lee Bartlow; a star, Georgia Lorrison; and a director, Fred Amiel. He is a hard-driving, ambitious man who ruthlessly uses everyone on the way to becoming one of Hollywood's top movie makers.

A scrupulously honest lawyer discovers that the client he's gotten off was really guilty.

Going undercover as the notorious "Waco Kid," U.S. Army Captain Jeff Packard manages to infiltrate a gang of gold-shipment thieves lead by nasty Walt Anderson. But Anderson and his gang are not the only troublemakers around: Packard must also contend with Geronimo and his Apache warriors, who are demanding guns in exchange for peace.

The police arrest a man climbing over the wall of a cemetery after midnight. He claims that he is being blackmailed and is following instructions he received by mail to leave $1000 on a certain grave. It turns out that he's not the only one who got a blackmail letter from the same person--calling himself "The Black Panther"--and it also turns out that all the recipients are connected to an opera company.