An ambitious TV soap actress connives with her producer to scuttle the career of the show's long-time star, but nothing works as they plan.

[Reading unrehearsed lines off the TelePrompTer]
Celeste Talbert: [as Maggie] Dr. Randall, what a surprise! Are you having lunch here?
Jeffrey Anderson: [as Dr. Randall] I will if it's that sample. Huh... I wish it was that simple.
Edmund Edwards: [offstage] This guy never heard of contact lenses?
Jeffrey Anderson: [as Dr. Randall] The test results have come back.
Celeste Talbert: [as Maggie] And?
Jeffrey Anderson: [as Dr. Randall] And I'm afraid the results are very disturbing. It seems that Angelique has a rare case of brake fluid...
[pause]
Jeffrey Anderson: Bran... fluid. Bran flavor.
Burton White: What the hell?
David Barnes: [offstage] Brain fever!
Edmund Edwards: [offstage, loudly] Say it!
Celeste Talbert: [as Maggie] Brain fever!
Jeffrey Anderson: [as Dr. Randall] Yes. Brain fever. Or what we call in Austria...
[they both goggle at the word]
Jeffrey Anderson: Kopfgeschlagen. At the current rate of inflation, her brain will laterally explore the...
Celeste Talbert: [as Maggie] Literally explode?
Jeffrey Anderson: [as Dr. Randall] Exactly, within the next three houses.
Celeste Talbert: [as Maggie] Hours?
Jeffrey Anderson: [as Dr. Randall] Yes, will literally explode within next three hours. I would suggest leaving the restraint.
Celeste Talbert: [as Maggie] Restaurant?
Jeffrey Anderson: [as Dr. Randall] Restaurant, yes.
Celeste Talbert: [as Maggie] Her brain will actually explode?
Jeffrey Anderson: [as Dr. Randall] Yes, yes, I've, um, seen it happen. It's a dreadful, dreadful thug. Thing.
Jeffrey Anderson: You have beautiful eyes.
Ariel Maloney: Ooh, they're nothing compared to my tits.
Celeste Talbert: [accepting an award] Ohhh, there's so many people to thank. First of all, my fabulous supporting cast, who gives a new meaning to the word "support"...
[At their table]
Ariel Maloney: Bitch!
David Barnes: Hag!
Montana Moorehead: I hate her so much!
Jeffrey Anderson: Of course I'm an egomaniac! I have America's Sweetheart climbing up my drainpipe!
Montana Moorehead: [about Lori Craven] She has more lines than I do and she's a GOD DAMN MUTE!
Jeffrey Anderson: One more date we would've had a Greek tragedy on our hands.
Celeste Talbert: Yes. Yes. Yes. I AM guilty. Guilty of love in the first degree.
Montana Moorehead: Get rid of Celeste and Mr Fuzzy is yours.
Edwards: There's a nurse in the restaurant. Did I miss a meeting?
Montana Moorehead: [as Lori, Celeste, And Jeffrey kiss and make up] WAIT! Wait! But I'm carrying his child!
Jeffrey Anderson: [annoyed] I didn't sleep with her! Will somebody please believe me!
[Ariel and Rose enter as doctors]
Jeffrey Anderson: Doctor!
Ariel Maloney: A second opinion...
[Celeste mouths to Rose asking what she's doing]
Ariel Maloney: ...this is Dr. Frans Blau of the sex change clinic in Bethesda, Maryland.
Rose Schwartz: Thank you. Dr. Randall, after extensive investigations, I've come to the conclusion that it's virtually impossible for you to have impregnated your nurse - Montana Moorehead - because before she came to our little clinic, she was... Milton Moorehead of Syosset, Long Island. Hello!
[Rose opens the high school yearbook showing Montana's teenage boy photo]
Montana Moorehead: [shouts and runs off] NO! NO! NO!
[offstage - watching the monitor as it is revealed on live TV that Montana is a man]
Edmund Edwards: She's a boy!
[long, incredulous pause]
David Barnes: Yeah, well we *knew* that.
[starts gagging]
Edmund Edwards: Are you okay?
David Barnes: [weak voice] I'm fine. I'm just going to go congratulate the others.
Celeste Talbert: Oh, I'll tell you why I'm here! I'm here because... I... I...
Jeffrey Anderson: Come on, say it! "I want you, Jeffery. I'm consumed with jealousy for my neice, because I want you."
Celeste Talbert: Oh, please!
Jeffrey Anderson: Admit it, you have feelings for me.
Celeste Talbert: My feelings are ABOUT you, not FOR you. There's a big difference!
David Barnes: I was under orders.
Celeste Talbert: So - was - Hitler! Oh, no, I don't mean Hitler, I mean the other guy, the other one.
David Barnes: Himmler.
Celeste Talbert: No, no, no.
David Barnes: Hess.
Rose Schwartz: Eichmann.
David Barnes: Eichmann.
Jeffrey Anderson: You speak beautifully for a mute.
Jeffrey Anderson: No, no, no, doing dinner theatre is horrible. Doing hemorrhoid commercials is horrible. What you did... there are no words for!
Rose Schwartz: You know, I'd think you were acting, but you've never been this good.
Lori Craven: Hi. Uh, I'm Lori Craven and... I'm an actress.
Betsy Faye Sharon: An actress! Really! How nice for you! I'm Betsy Faye Sharon and I'm a bitch. Now get out of here.
Rose Schwartz: The guy was killed in an auto accident! I looked it up! He was driving in the Yukon, in a pink convertible, to visit his brother who's an ex-con named Frances, when a tractor trailer comes along and decapitates him. You know what that mean, it means he doesn't have a head. How am I suppose to write for a guy who doesn't have a head? He's got no lips, no vocal cords. What do you want me to do?
Lori Craven: Celeste, I want to act!
Celeste Talbert: Don't say that, "I want to act", ever, please!
[Jeffrey is about to prepare the brain transplant]
Lori Craven: MOTHER!
[Celeste sits up]
Lori Craven: No, I can't let you do this!
Burton White: She spoke?
Jeffrey Anderson: She spoke!
Montana Moorehead: Sudden speech, the last stages of brain fever! She can blow up any moment!
Lori Craven: I can always speak! Mother...
Montana Moorehead: She's MY mother!
Celeste Talbert: MONTANA, SHUT UP!
David Barnes: So, who dies? It can't be one of the regulars...
Montana Moorehead: Not even Bolt?
David Barnes: Bolt? No, Bolt's gold, especially with that whole impotency thing coming up. One of the extras...
Montana Moorehead: One of the homeless, David, one of the homeless.
David Barnes: That's cruel.
Montana Moorehead: It's very cruel.
[to her male costar]
Celeste Talbert: Next time, could you wear a swimsuit underneath the towel? It's a little early in the day for me.
[walks off]
Blair Brennan: I can't act in a swimsuit.
Tawny Miller: I know...
Celeste Talbert: David! David! David, David, David, David, David!
David Barnes: Hey, great scene with Bolt.
Celeste Talbert: I realize I'm not a young woman; however...
David Barnes: What do you mean, you're not...
Celeste Talbert: ...could you PLEASE point out to our new costume designer
[grabs her]
Celeste Talbert: whose name I don't quite have yet...
Tawny Miller: Tawny Miller, Miss Talbert.
Celeste Talbert: How do you do.
[to David]
Celeste Talbert:
David Barnes: [to Tawny] You're fired.
Tawny Miller: Oh God.
David Barnes: I'm just kidding.
[into PA system]
David Barnes: Attention: no turbans for Miss Talbert!
Betsy Faye Sharon: She came in yesterday. I don't know who the hell she is. Her name is Naven, Maven, Slaven... Claven... there's no agent.
David Barnes: Find her.
Betsy Faye Sharon: Well, what if she can't act?
Burton White: That never stopped us before!
[Barnes snaps his fingers]
Betsy Faye Sharon: What?
David Barnes: [snap, snap, snap, snap, snap] We make her mute!
Burton White: What?
David Barnes: If she doesn't speak, we don't have to pay her as much. A homeless deaf-mute: what could be more pathetic? God, I'm good.
[Explaining his proposal for a one-man Hamlet play]
Jeffrey Anderson: See, my - my theory is that all the characters are Hamlet: it's all happening in Hamlet's head. So you only need one actor.
Jeffrey Anderson: Don't call me Mr. Loman! My name is Anderson! Anderson! ANDERSON!
Edmund Edwards: She's been through hell, and we're her family. So in this crisis, we have to support her.
Rose Schwartz: Yeah.
Edmund Edwards: We have to love her.
Rose Schwartz: Mmm.
Edmund Edwards: We have to care about her.
Rose Schwartz: Mmm.
Edmund Edwards: And we have to milk it for every drop of publicity we can get.
Celeste Talbert: What I feel like is Gloria effing Swanson. I'm 42 yrs old, I don't want to be dressed like a dead woman."
Ariel Maloney: Why, Bolt! I didn't realize you were here.
Bolt: Well... I am.
Celeste Talbert: Even for an actor, you're an egomaniac!
Celeste Talbert: I'm not a genius. I'm just a working actress.
[scene switch back and forth of Celeste, Lori, and Jeffrey in Edwards' office]
Celeste Talbert: I never worked in an atmosphere like this before.
Jeffrey Anderson: This whole pregnancy thing is a scam! I resent being treated like a leper!
Lori Craven: Having to work with these two is a personal nightmare for me. I'm on the verge of a breakdown!
Celeste Talbert: I'm on the verge of a nervous breakdown!
Jeffrey Anderson: I could conceivably have a breakdown.
Lori Craven: I mean, can you imagine what it's like having to face them on the set every single day?
Celeste Talbert: It just seems to get harder and harder, even though I devoted my entire life to this show.
Jeffrey Anderson: [walks back and forth lost for words] Uh...
Lori Craven: Mr. Edwards, it's them or me, that is the bottom line here. They go or I go!
Edwards: This is the toughest decision I ever have to make, but I get paid 1.2 million dollars to make these kind of command decisions. So here it is...
[eats a cracker]
Lori Craven: [bursting into David's office] We need to talk. Look, I don't care WHAT Tawny Miller says. This hat makes me look like the GOD damned Tweety Bird.
[to Montana]
Lori Craven: Do you mind?
Montana Moorehead: You, you're asking me to leave?
Lori Craven: That's right. I'm asking you to leave.
Montana Moorehead: David...
David Barnes: Miss Moorehead, may Miss Craven and I have a moment alone, please?
Montana Moorehead: No problem. I'm a professional. I do things professionally.
[storms out]
Montana Moorehead: [from off stage] I hate you! I hate you, you pig!
David Barnes: She's got a lot of spirit.
Lori Craven: She's a deranged bitch!
Celeste Talbert: I never said I was the best mother in the world. Give me a little credit, will you, credit for being someone who tried... to love you the only way she knew how?
Lori Craven: I know that speech.
Celeste Talbert: You do?
Lori Craven: Yeah, it was the, uh, the Thanksgiving show, when Maggie meets Bolt's blind nephew.
Burton White: [watching the live episode unfold] At last, DRAMA!
Lori Craven: Get out!
Celeste Talbert: [crying] Please try to understand what I am going through.
Lori Craven: I don't give a *shit* what you're going through!
Celeste Talbert: There's no need to use that kind of language.
Lori Craven: [shouts] Get out! Now!
Rose Schwartz: Actors don't like to play coma. They feel it limits their range.
Nurse Nan: Sudden speech, the last sign of brain fever. She could blow at any moment!
Montana Moorehead: [to David] What kind of moron are you?
Rose Schwartz: I'm looking at crawdad butts, cover 'em up!
David Barnes: Listen, she just won her 8th Schmenger, right? Edmund's crazy about her. She's got a lot of juice.
Montana Moorehead: Well, that's when you dump people, okay? When they're still on top, before they lose their popularity and drag the show down with them.
David Barnes: [about Montana] She's got a lot of spirit.
Lori Craven: She's a deranged bitch.
[an audition]
Betsy Faye Sharon: Very, very good, Mark. And very true. I love what you're doing. I just, I think if we could try it one more time, and this time... I don't know... maybe try one without your shirt.
Mark: Sure.
[Removes it and reviews the script]
Mark: "Will you be having wine with dinner?"
Betsy Faye Sharon: [lustily] I think we've found our waiter!
Ariel Maloney: New boy in town?
Jeffrey Anderson: Just got off the choo-choo... you have lovely eyes.
Ariel Maloney: They're nothing compared to my tits! You should come up and see them sometime!
Celeste Talbert: This is my husband, Bolt.
Ariel Maloney: [after seeing Montana on the Enquirer, angry in tears] Bitch!
Celeste Talbert: Why are you here?
Jeffrey Anderson: This is my apartment. I live here. Why are YOU here?
Edwards: I would like to voice my strong concern about this show's spiraling decline in ratings. David, ever since you took us to the Caribbean, it's been Jamaica homeless people sucking soup, and a big wave outside that cost a hundred thousand dollars. That's depressing and it's expensive, two words I hate. You know the words I like? I like the word "peppy" and the word "cheap". Peppy and cheap.
Jeffrey Anderson: Of course I can kiss her!
Lori Craven: This is ridiculous! I can kiss who I want!
Celeste Talbert: No! You can't! You can't kiss her!
Jeffrey Anderson: Why because she's *your* neice?
Celeste Talbert: [shouts] No, you nitwit! Because she's my daughter! And your daughter.
Lori Craven: What?
Jeffrey Anderson: What are you talking about?
Celeste Talbert: We're her parents! *You* and I!
[sobbing]
Celeste Talbert: We're her Mommy and her Daddy.
Celeste Talbert: What are you doing here?
Jeffrey Anderson: This is my apartment, I live here, what are YOU doing here?
Lori Craven: You people have the morals of guinney pigs!
Montana Moorehead: [after seeing Lori on People magazine] YOU - promised me you would get rid of Celeste. WE WERE BOTH NAKED AND YOU PROMISED! NAKED!
David Barnes: Hey! We were never naked.
Montana Moorehead: Well, we could've been! Not only did you get rid of Celeste but you - YOU CREATED LORI! This ingénue from HELL! She has more lines than I do and she's a GOD... DAMN... MUTE!