This is a telling of the Jessica Savitch story, the newswoman who, in the 1970s, became the "First Woman Anchor". Tally Atwater (Michelle Pfeiffer) is taken under the wing of Warren Justice (Robert Redford) in a Miami newsroom and becomes a news star on television. Despite her love for Warren, she takes the big chance and moves on to Philadelphia, where he follows to rescue her faltering career at the cost of his own - as she rises, he falls.