Theater director Caden Cotard (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is mounting a new play. His life catering to suburban blue-hairs at the local regional theater in Schenectady New York is looking bleak. His wife Adele (Catherine Keener) has left him to pursue her painting in Berlin taking their young daughter Olive with her. His therapist Madeleine Gravis (Hope Davis) is better at plugging her best-seller than she is at counseling him.