TV news coverage goes off the rails when a reporter misses a jail break while chatting with the chief of police on the prison steps. The escapee, pursued frantically by the inept jailer responsible for his freedom and a hotshot encyclopedia salesman bent on a sale, is further complicated by an off-the-wall TV station manager and a pair of star circus performers - one of whom, ahem, is dead. Finally, a slick female legal student irons everything out and turns humiliating defeat into a twisted surprise ending.