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On a hot evening in a New York tenement, neighbors gossip about each other as they return home.  The main object of comment is the sadly romantic Anna Maurrant, who is having an affair with married milk collector Steve Sankey.  Anna's brutish husband Frank is often away, and while he is supicious, he has no proof of the affair.  Frank comes home and yells at Anna for not knowing where their children Willie and Rose are, while social worker Alice Simpson reprimands poverty-stricken Laura Hildebrand, who is about to be evicted, for taking her children, Mary and Charlie, to the movies.

Kindly Filippo Fiorentino, who longs to have children with his wife Greta, gives the Hildebrands money for the show, and socialist Abe Kaplan argues with Frank about the negative effects of capitalism.  Abe's son Sam tells the building's most active gossiper, Emma Jones, to mind her own business when she passes along a juicy tidbit about Anna to Greta, and later, Rose comes home.  She is accompanied by her married office manager, Mr.  Easter, who wishes to set her up in an apartment.

Although Rose desperately wishes to escape her dirty, mean-spirited surroundings, she refuses to become Easter's mistress.  After Easter leaves, Rose talks with Sam, whom she regards as a best friend even though he is in love with her.  She encourages Sam to believe in himself and nourish his individuality.

The next morning, Sam's sister Shirley, a schoolteacher who has sacrificed everything so that her brother might succeed in life, asks him why he wants to get involved with Rose, as she is not Jewish.  Sam tells Shirley to forget her race prejudices, after which Frank yells at Anna as he leaves for work.  The Hildebrands are evicted, and Shirley asks Rose not to encourage Sam's romantic ideas about her, because Shirley wants him to go to law school.  Rose assures her that she does not want to be married yet, and she leaves with Easter for the funeral of their employer.  Sam sees Sankey arrive to visit Anna, then watches in horror as Frank comes home unexpectedly.  Sam yells a warning to Anna, but it is too late, for Frank has caught the lovers together.  Frank shoots his wife and Sankey, then rushes away.  Rose arrives home as Anna is taken away in an ambulance.

While the neighborhood thrives on the scandal, Rose returns from the hospital, where she saw her mother die.  Easter offers to help her, but Rose states that she will be able to care for herself and Willie.  After Rose has packed her clothes, the police capture Frank, who tells Rose that he meant to be a better father.  Sam wants to go away with Rose, but she tells him that they are too young to be married, and that it is important for him to fulfill his goals first.  Rose hugs Sam and Shirley, tells them that she will see them again, and then leaves to begin a new life away from the tenement.