Herta Mayen

A group of talented young people are dismissed from an ice dancing troupe as a result of the intrigues of Alida, the wife of impresario Gordon. Outraged, the young people leave Gordon's troupe and, having organized their own group, soon achieve success with audiences. Gordon, deprived of his talented performers, suffers a collapse and goes bankrupt.

A showgirl aspiring to greater things endeavours to sort out her financial and romantic problems.

Vienna is celebrating New Year’s Eve 1913/14. It is the year, which will see the outbreak of the First World War. In Hotel Sacher, the mood is excellent; and although the political atmosphere is charged, there’s an undercurrent of hate and intolerance in the air. It is with this background that Nadja, a Russian spy, meets the Austrian civil servant Stefan. He loves her, but comes under suspicion of being an agent because of this love.

The young emperor Joseph II of Austria and Hungary is not interested in romance and marriage, and every time his mother makes arrangements for him to meet eligible young ladies, he escapes under some pretense. This time he is off on a 'tour of inspection' with his trusted friend von Kleber. Things become complicated when von Kleber, pretending to be the emperor so as to protect the real Joseph from discovery, falls in love with Christine, the landlady of their lodgings. And when Christine later writes to the emperor, her letter is read by the mother of the real emperor, as keen as ever to see him getting married, and so the lady is invited to the imperial court.