Weather-beaten screen siren Marilyn Hack (Catherine O'Hara) has been struggling for recognition for thirty years. After some short-lived notoriety in the late eighties for her freakish role as an over-painted strumpet in the seamy Song for Reuben, her star has long since faded. Her latest gig is playing Esther Pisker, the ailing mamele of a Jewish family in the Deep South awaiting the return of her estranged daughter Rachel - played by belligerent stand-up comic Kelly Webb (Parker Posey)—in the melodrama Home for Purim. One day, Marilyn gets wind of an Internet rumor that her performance could land her an Academy Award nomination. Soon Oscar fever spreads and co-stars Victor Allen Miller (Harry Shearer)—best known as the Foot-Long Wiener—and Kelly get bit too.