Plot

Hoping for positive publicity, a tobacco company offers $25 million to any American town that quits smoking for 30 days. Amid the media frenzy, Eagle Rock, Iowa accepts the challenge--and the company's PR man tries to sabotage the effort.

Reverend Brooks leads his town in a contest to stop smoking for a month, But some tobacco executives don't want them to win, and try everything they can to make them smoke. If the townspeople don't go nuts from wanting a cigarette, or kill each other from irritation and frustration, they will win a huge prize.—Brian W Martz <B.Martz@Genie.com>

Merwin Wren, longtime PR head at Valiant Tobacco, comes up with an idea in his desire to have company figurehead Hiram C. Grayson be known in the same vein as Alfred Nobel as opposed to the man who sold 13 trillion cancer-causing cigarettes (who remembers that Nobel was a munitions manufacturer, he who used only a small fraction of his wealth to hand out a Peace Prize?): give $25 million to any town in America that will give up smoking for 30 days. After the company executives' laughter at this ridiculous scheme subsides, Wren convinces them that no town can meet the eligibility criteria of 100% of its citizens signing up, and even in the remote possibility that anyone does, that not all 100% would be able to go cold turkey for 30 days, meaning that this PR stunt to raise Grayson to immortality would cost them virtually nothing. To Wren's amazement, one town meets the sign-up criteria by the entry deadline: Eagle Rock, Iowa, a town with a population of 4,006 that's declining as one business and industry after another is leaving town, taking its citizens. Rev. Clayton Brooks was the one who spearheaded the initiative in his own self-motivated goal of raising the town's fortunes so that he will be reassigned to the town and church of his choice, preferably more prosperous ones. Using various tactics, he was able to convince everyone in town to sign up, even the large percentage of die-hard smokers, the toughest case being Dr. Proctor, the town's surgeon. Beyond everyone needing to go cold turkey for 30 days, the contest brings up some systemic problems within the community, both as a collective and individually. In the latter category is Rev. Brooks' own failings as a husband to his repressed wife Natalie. Conversely, as Eagle Rock might actually win the $25 million, Wren takes it upon himself to ensure that it doesn't happen.—Huggo