Combining rare archival footage and still photographs with never-before seen live footage of the Miss America Pageant today, this film explores why Miss America is both wildly popular and widely scorned. It chronicles how the Pageant was an entrée to Hollywood and Broadway in the 1920s and 1930s, an avenue to academic success in the 1940s and 1950s and, above all, a battleground where the country’s most conservative and progressive elements have fought for their representation of American womanhood to reign supreme.