Plot

Avi Rosen knows what's really funny: the laughs come with dollar signs in Hollywood. Bidding farewell to his crotchety grandmother, who wishes he'd find a nice Jewish girl and open a pharmacy, Avi leaves the Big Apple and heads West to Tinseltown. Shacking up with an old comic buddy from the East Coast, Avi is surprised to find his once caustic friend an incense-sniffing yoga nut seemingly let loose in LALA land. But the changes Avi experiences end up being far more unsettling. Avi is quickly immersed in the gritty maneuvers of sitcom star making by Leo Stein, an unscrupulous but influential back room power player. Leo capitalizes on the young comedian's blinding desire for success and propels him past the aspiring entertainers Avi soon counts as friends, who have been paying their dues far longer than the recent transplant. When one of those overlooked comedians, Sarah Green, becomes his lover, he mistakes her warnings about his nefarious manager as professional jealousy. Nearly too late does Avi learn she knows of what she speaks. What seems the perfect set up soon falls flat, and the savvy New Yorker suddenly finds the stage a very lonely place. When a broken hearted Sarah flees to New York, Avi Rosen must choose between the glitter of Hollywood and the gold of love.—Paul Oscar Hamilton