An orphan is provisionally adopted by the manager of a hotel populated by show business people. The hotel's owner doesn't like the entertainers and wants the girl returned to the orphanage.

"Chick" Thompson is a puppet-master in a traveling carnival whose wife dies in childbirth and leaves him with an infant son he names "Poochy." His father-in-law and the baby's grandfather sues him for custody of the baby and Chick takes his son and hides out for a couple of years. He joins his former assistants, Daisy and "Fingers", in a circus act only to find that the persistent grandfather is still on his trail.

While visiting the circus with his family, Charlie is recruited by the big top's co-owner to investigate threatening letters that he's received.

20th Century Fox's highly fabricated film biography of circus showman P. T. Barnum stars Wallace Beery (as Barnum), Virginia Bruce (as Jenny Lind), Janet Beecher and Adolphe Menjou. Released in 1934.

Truant officers mistake 2 midgets for members of the gang.

A magic lamp lets a young couple become kids again and exposes a mean old man who runs his orphanage like a prison.