A comedy about a screenwriter (Wuhl) whose old movie script is read by a producer (Landau) and the search for financial backers begins. But it seems that each money source (Aiello, DeNiro, Wallach) has his own mistress that he wants put into the film. Gradually, the screenwriter is forced to make changes to his script to accommodate these backers until he finally sees no semblance of his original ideas in the writing.

High school sweethearts Roslyn and Michael, now in their twenties, co-exist in a deeply unfulfilling marriage with kids. Both embark on extramarital affairs, unaware of the violent repercussions that await.

Jennifer is a lovely teen who has been hired to baby-sit the kids of Harry Tucker and his wife, Dolly. The Tuckers go to a party and proceed to get inebriated, with Mr. Tucker fantasizing about his beautiful baby sitter. Meanwhile, Jack, her boyfriend, and Mark, another guy interested in her, decide to spy on Jennifer at the Tucker house, with each young man also fixated on her.

Ruby and her husband Claude are a working-class couple who live in suburban Arkansas. As crazy as they are for each other, their relationship is far from harmonious. (The lack of money doesn't help matters, either.) In fact, their whole family is fraught with unresolved conflicts. Then Claude's uncle is arrested on a felony charge, and everyone rallies round. Ruby's mother Jewel and flirtatious sister Rose (Claude's ex-girlfriend) even fly in from Tennessee; but, far from being a source of support, Jewel seems only to want to break up Ruby and Claude.