Carol is an aspiring screenwriter from Los Angeles who hooks up with a hunky young farmhand at a writers festival in Austin. She thinks it’s just a one-time festival fling, but he thinks she’s a Hollywood bigshot and is about to launch his film career. Hilarity ensues after she finds out he quit his job on the farm to live with her and she has to fake it until he makes it to the big time.

SYNOPSIS:

Backstory: In the early 90’s Carol was an aspiring screenwriter in LA making good money as a waitress at a strip club where she met Roger, an aspiring documentarian who worked at a bowling alley and wanted to be the next Michael Moore. They fell in love and had a daughter, but didn’t get married because he wanted to wait until he made it big and they could have a proper wedding and honeymoon.

His documentaries weren’t very good but he was good at talking rich dudes into funding them and Carol worked them into shape since she was better at stories, sound, and editing. At the peak of the Dot Com Bubble they had a hit documentary about a hot tech company that later went bust that was actually funded by the company as a hype video and they paid Roger with stock he sold before it collapsed while spending millions to promote it; which is how he got rich.

Roger became a pseudo-celebrity mingling with tech millionaires, self-help gurus, movie producers, and other con artists. Film critics heralded him as the next Michael Moore, while Carol was identified as his girlfriend; if she was identified at all.

Carol stayed home as Roger began traveling the world to promote his movie and “accidentally” got married to his young assistant after knocking her up during a three week trip to Italy; only telling Carol about it after she found a picture of the wedding on a tech blog because a young Elon Musk was there looking drunk.

Roger avoided paying child support by hiding all his income until after his daughter turned twenty-one and Carol didn’t bother fighting Roger because she felt it wasn’t worth the hassle and just never wanted to see him again. He maintained a reputation as a great documentarian, even though he really lives on his stock portfolio while his movies are just vanity projects that lose him money.

After Roger cut her off financially, Carol found work as a bookkeeper for a small indie film studio and later earned a college degree in accounting while working full-time and eventually a CPA license. She’s now the Controller for a subsidiary of a subsidiary of a major movie studio, where she collects and pays millions to hide profits for the studio.

She makes decent money but lives frugally because she's paying off a big student loan after foolishly getting an MBA a few years earlier and used to have high credit card debt from going out so much. Now she brings her lunch to work, drives an old Subaru she paid off long ago, and doesn’t go to bars unless it’s a special occasion. But she still writes and once a year goes to the Austin Writers Festival just to keep her foot in the game where she mingles with producers, writers, and old friends.

The movie begins with Carol walking along Sixth Street and up the steps of the Driskill Hotel in lovely downtown Austin. She goes to the festival registration table and chitchats with the staff to exchange exposition that explains much of her backstory disguised as conversation; including that Roger is there to premiere his new documentary along with his new fiance. She heads to the bar for a drink.

While Carol waits for her drink, Roger comes up with his new fiancé, who is seven years younger than their daughter and five years younger than his last wife. He mentions how they met three months earlier during a rainstorm in Mozambique and are already planning their month long honeymoon in Thailand where he’ll be filming his latest documentary about why younger women prefer to marry older men. Carol exchanges gibes and backstory with Roger, then heads outside with her drink to smoke a cigarette and fume.

Carol is sitting on the steps of the Driskill with her drink and cigarette, silently fuming; right next to a No Smoking sign. A giant pickup truck rumbles up blasting terrible country music with the hood up high in the illegal Carolina Squat position as the front of the truck is higher than the back, thus preventing the driver from seeing over the hood and imperiling everything in front of him. Black smoke bellows from underneath; poisoning the air everywhere it goes. On the back is a blue ball sack that looks like large bull testicles dangling from the trailer hitch.

Carol lightly coughs and puts out her cigarette. Tyler rolls down his window with a confused look on his face as the music blares. He shouts at her but she can’t hear a word and signals for him to turn down his music.

Tyler is a hunky 22 year old farmhand from Tyler Texas visiting the big city for the first time. He had his only screenplay of a hyper-violent space western make it to the second round of the festival despite it basically being The Wild Bunch set in the Star Wars universe. He’s been driving around downtown Austin for the last two hours trying to find the festival because he thought it’d be a big festival and not a hotel. There are handprints around his truck from pedestrians, bicyclists, and cops he almost hit along the way.

He shouts to Carol if this is where the writer’s festival is and she shouts back that it is and points to a parking lot down the street where he can park his truck. He shouts a thanks to her, then drives off, turning up the music and running over several curbs he couldn’t see while blowing a large plume of black exhaust on Carol. She smiles like she had just seen a literal baby and gets up to greet him.

Carol and Tyler are at a table by the bar on their third drink. He’s rambling about his movie and how he’s going to be the Zach Synder of Space Westerns with lots of slo-motion and crazy CGI in his obvious Star Wars ripoff. She tries to explain how expensive it would be and the basics of how film budgeting works, but he insists he can do most of it on his computer at the farm and just needs a million dollars to pay for actors and props; then asks if she knows Matt Damon or Ben Affleck because he needs them both in his movie.

Carol smiles and explains to him about the cost of filmmaking using a hypothetical budget as if she’s speaking to a child, but he takes it as if she’s describing a real budget to make his movie because he doesn’t know what the word hypothetical means.

He interrupts to tell her that he knows how Hollyweird works and was expecting that he might have to put out in order to get his movie made and was just glad it was an attractive lady like her and not some creepy old dude so he’ll do whatever it takes and is fine with whatever budget she wants. She smiles and thanks him for that and asks him what his plans in life are.

Tyler explains that he spent his whole paycheck on fuel for his truck because he didn’t know how much it’d take to get to Austin and doesn’t think he’s got enough gas to get back home after the festival. He was planning to sleep in his truck and his only food is deer jerky he made himself. In fact, he hadn’t even eaten since breakfast at 6 AM and he’s starting to feel woozy.

He’s only written one script but he’s certain it’s the big one and assumed he could sell it at the festival so he could pay off his truck before the repo man found him because he’s six months late on his truck payments and old man McGee didn’t even know he was taking off because it’s the busy season on the farm and he didn’t like Tyler’s dumb movie ideas. So this is kind of a make it a break it thing for him.

Carol tells him that she can help him, meaning with gas money, room, and food. But he thinks she means with getting his movie made and he really perks up and tells her that he’ll put out extra hard for her. She tells him that’s really not necessary and offers to take him to dinner.

After dinner and more drinks, she hands him her business card that has the major studio’s name under the actual company she works for. He remarks that her title is Controller, which he says sounds really important and says something like he thinks she’s a big wig. She says something sarcastic about how exciting her job is, but he thinks she’s serious.

He asks her what CPA stands for and she says Cinematic Production Asshole as a joke, but he thinks she’s serious and she’s too embarrassed to correct him so she just smiles and changes the subject. But he still thinks she’s a big shot, especially because she knows everyone at the festival.

Carol stumbles back to her room with Tyler but is disappointed because it’s tiny with a small bed covered in her crap and no view. She goes to the front desk for a bigger room while pretending to be a big shot and the clerk tells her that she’s in luck because the only big room available is the honeymoon suite; the most expensive room in the hotel.

She leans over and tries to discreetly ask the clerk how much the suite is without Tyler hearing. The clerk leans over and discreetly tells her that if madam has to ask, it’s too much. She gets indignant and loudly proclaims that she’s taking the suite for all three nights and tells him to send up champagne and chocolates, like she does it all the time. The clerk smirks because that always works.

We get a music montage of them spending the next three nights together, in a blur of food, booze, parties, events, and sex as Carol proudly shows off her hunky dumb guy; especially whenever Roger is around with his bimbo. They order room service countless times and eat at the most expensive restaurants. He’s guzzling $200 bottles of wine and ordering two steaks at a time and she plays along like this is normal to her. She's sitting on her bed with a pile of receipts, then tosses them into the air like snow, laughing at how funny that is as they litter the room. The music ends and the montage fades to black.

It’s the final day. Check out time at the front desk. Tyler looks the same as always. Carol looks incredibly hung over. Her hair is disheveled. Her makeup is smeared. She’s wearing sunglasses, a long coat over shorts, and mismatched shoes. The snooty clerk returns her credit card, explaining that they don’t take Costco and asks if she possibly has a sixth credit card. She apologizes and says she’s really really hung over, then pukes just a little into a bag. The clerk smirks. She gets out her checkbook with a plan to text the payroll guy to give her an advance on her next two paychecks so she can cover it.

It ends with Tyler taking hungover Carol to the airport in his obnoxious truck. He gets out and helps her down and they have a final kiss in the drop-off terminal as exhaust fumes engulf them. She waves goodbye with a smile as Tyler rolls coal for Carol one last time to the anger of absolutely everyone, then he drives off in a roar, almost running over a family of five at a crosswalk.

She heads into the terminal as black mist swirls around her, tossing her puke bag into the trash can with a smile. The perfect ending to the perfect festival fling. Or so she thinks.

Two weeks later Carol is on her MacBook in a meeting with the Board of Directors going over budget numbers on the large screen when a a text message from The Hunk pops up: “Hey sweetcheeks” He says he quit his job and will be at her place in two days so he can get his career going just like they talked about.

She flashes to a foggy memory of saying he could quit his job and live with her while they cuddled in bed surrounded by empty champagne bottles. He mutters that he’d have to give two weeks notice to old man McGee. She ignores him, grabbing the menu and saying they need to order a third breakfast.

The Board members all look at her while she tries to not make a face. Another message pops up saying his momma expects them to get married and asks if she can be invited to the wedding. She asks the Board if they have any questions about the budget and the chairman says no, not about the budget. She then excuses herself and goes to have a panic attack.

Carol tells her assistant about this as she tries to figure out what to do, since her credit card bills are already coming due and she can barely afford to pay the interest let alone feed Jethro Bodine a thousand pounds of caviar a day. Plus, her apartment is a mess and he hates cats. Her assistant mocks her and tells her she had it coming. Carol decides her only chance is to fake it until she can make him successful because that’s how it’s done in Hollywood. Her assistant laughs harder.

Roger is in Thailand for the month filming his honeymoon and their daughter is watching his house in Malibu, so Carol moves in since she feels like it should have been her house anyway; even though it’s obviously a bachelor pad with a weird sex room, a sexy hot tub that’s permanently stained, and a manly bedroom with mirrors everywhere.

Weirdoes show up at random times to party and/or have sex and Carol has to pretend like she’s down with it; freaking out Tyler with bad BDSM talk to convince him that these really are her friends and she used to be into drug orgies but is trying to cut down on it now that she met him.

Music montage as Carol gives Tyler a makeover to change him from real farmboy to Hollywood Farmboy. She starts with basic hygiene like how to wipe his butt properly, wear deodorant, and take a shower once a day including how to wash his privates while explaining that it doesn’t make him gay if he enjoys it. She buys him clothes and teaches him proper manners.

They drive around LA in his truck rolling coal on everyone because he thinks it’s funny. At one point he makes her drive Roger’s run down super car from the early 2000’s that she has trouble getting into gear and gets stuck on every bump, which she pretends is her car.

She helps him rewrite his script and teaches him how to pitch it better, getting him to cut out all the space stuff because it’s too expensive and doesn’t add anything to the story. He takes her advice and admits that her version is easier to explain. It’s still terrible, but it’s Hollywood Terrible and she’s hoping that’s good enough.

Carol arranges to get tickets to charity events, movie premieres, and into the “right” restaurants so they can mingle with important people and maybe, just maybe meet someone who can produce his dumb movie.

Tyler bumbles at every event, saying the wrong things to the right people, demanding steak at a vegan dinner, feuding with a beloved child actor, punching a paparazzi who took his picture because he thought he was Joey from Friends, etc.

Carol still has to do her accounting job as work piles up at the office; once sneaking into the office in formal wear at night to get work done and waking up with makeup smeared on a tax return the next morning. And all the clothes, parties, dinners, and everything are putting her deeper in debt as she had to take out a personal loan just to have enough room on her credit card to keep paying for everything. And the time is ticking until Roger comes home.

Finally, a bigtime producer is interested in making Tyler’s terrible movie because he likes Tyler’s style and assumes he can fix the script later. Carol just needs one last meeting to seal the deal. But…Roger came home early after he caught his fiancé cheating on him with a basketball team. He brought home a new girl who is one year younger than Tyler and just as naive.

While Carol is at work, Tyler is naked in Roger’s bed. Roger crawls into bed, thinking that the girl is already there but it’s Tyler. They do funny touching stuff until Tyler freaks out and puts Roger in an armbar; threatening to break it off. The girl comes in and helps Roger convince Tyler he’s Carol’s ex-husband and that the house belongs to him.

Roger pours drinks and listens to Tyler talk about his terrible movie idea and asks the name of the producer. Tyler tells him and Roger smiles and walks off to make a few calls. The girl is checking out Tyler and tells him she likes his bod. He says “yeah I work out a lot” and flexes his arms a little. They smile at each other.

Carol is supposed to meet Tyler outside the fancy restaurant where deals get made, but he didn't show and isn’t answering his texts or phone. She puts away her phone and goes inside the restaurant. At every table is a fat drunk producer with a big smile on his face, a sleazy drunk producer who looks like Roger with a devilish smile on his face, and a young drunk dummy with a dumb grin on his face.

She looks across the room and sees Roger smiling and talking to the Producer she had a meeting with. Tyler looks happy just to be there. Roger is explaining that Tyler's movie will be bigger than Star Wars and Wild Wild West put together. Tyler tries to speak but Roger shuts him down and reminds him what he said about letting Uncle Rog handle everything.

Carol confronts “Uncle Rog” and slams him for trying to horn in on her deal, but he turns the tables on her and attacks her for lying to Tyler and ruining his brilliant idea. Tyler stands up and yells at her that she treated him like a fool and she was trying to steal his movie. She says she’ll sue because she wrote so much of the script but Roger says they’re going with the original script because it’s perfect and her rewrites were crap.

She’s speechless, staring at the three of them. Then she steps back and stares around the room and sizes up what's really happening. All the producers are staring at her with snide looks on their faces. All the dumb calves are grinning at a joke they barely comprehend. The Maître d’ approaches and politely asks her to leave. She says something biting and walks out. All the men laugh like hogs and go back to their deals.

The Producer tells Roger that he likes what he sees but implies that Roger needs to put some skin in the game if he wants to be in the deal and Roger says that’s not a problem and he’s good for 10%. The Producer makes a face like it needs to be more and Roger immediately says 20% then 25%, even though he didn’t want to put anything in.

The Producer smiles then implies there’s no room in the deal for Tyler. Roger smiles and tells him that’s not a problem, making a joke implying that Tyler was too stupid to even know what they were talking about and they laugh, including Tyler who wants to look like he was paying attention. The Producer orders a round of drinks for the road so they can head to a titty bar. Tyler slams his beer and yells too loud.

At this point I’m stealing from Boogie Nights and ending this by just showing what happened to the characters in no particular order as music plays; which serves as a weird epilogue even though it's part of the movie.

Carol is back at her job, miserable. She almost makes a costly mistake that’s caught by her assistant because she’s having trouble concentrating and wishes she could at least apologize to Tyler. She tries meeting young guys in bars but instantly regrets it. She finally decides she needs to get back on the horse by writing and realizes that this story would be an interesting movie idea and starts writing it just to have something to do.

Tyler’s space western took too long to make and was a huge flop that came in ten times over budget despite looking terrible, due to all the crazy CGI that Carol had warned Tyler about. Roger lost everything after mortgaging his house and selling all his investments just to get the movie finished. Now he lives alone in an apartment where he makes promo videos for crypto bros while he slowly pays off all his debt and tries to raise funds for his next documentary.

Tyler ended up getting an acting job playing a dumb deputy on a TV western and married the girl Roger brought home from the honeymoon. They had six kids together…so far. He now drives a hybrid Hummer and is paid by an oil company to promote green energy.

Carol gets this screenplay to the second round of the Austin Writers Festival where she meets a cool guy her age who owns several successful bars in Austin and loves cats, giving deep back massages, and reading screenplays. She moves to Austin and marries the guy, pays off all her debt, and lives happily ever after. The End.