LA screenwriter BOB BROOKMONT has reached an impasse. His pathetic writing gigs are borderline porn, and his beloved unmade screenplay, Sweet Town, strikes out with a series of potential financial backers. Even JASON GOLD, his best friend and producing partner, can't get Sweet Town off the ground. During this stressful time, BOB'S DAD, who suffers from dementia, demands that he come home to Hadley, his small Midwestern hometown, but before BOB can make a decision he meets several people on his path to get his film up and running: a savvy money-man, a socially inept director, and the perfect leading lady. With his dad's health in decline, staying in LA is no longer an option. BOB painfully walks away from Sweet Town just as all the stars begin to align.
In a selfless act as the film's producer, JASON GOLD moves the now-funded Sweet Town production from Los Angeles to Hadley so BOB can be with his dad while they shoot the film. This deepens an already growing rift between BOB and the film's director, who has manipulated JASON into hiring his own crew members.
In Hadley, JASON and BOB are outflanked by unhappy crew members, who begin to wreck havoc upon the production. Disaster strikes on the first day of the shoot when the vitriolic assistant director pushes the crew on an absurdly ambitious schedule. Moving too hard and too fast, a grip guy loses his finger in an unfortunate accident, allowing JASON to regain control as producer of the film.
Desperate to prevent a crew mutiny, BOB secretly elicits help from a local production assistant, the town's mayor, and a few of his dad's friends. They surreptitiously give Sweet Town a fighting chance to make it to the last shooting day unscathed, But things aren't that easy. Sabotaged funerals, paint-spilling dogs and other hilariously awful acts of vengeance force production into a downward spiral, with BOB fighting behind the scenes each day to keep the shoot from crashing.
The crew's mean-spirited antics start to spill out into the town, which infuriates Hadley locals, all of whom want to see BOB, their hometown wunderkind, succeed at his filmmaking dream. With the help of his friends, BOB uses his Hollywood wits and Hadley knowledge to outmaneuver the crew once again.
