Detroit, the early 1960s. Curtis Taylor, Jr., a car salesman, breaks into the music business with big dreams. He signs a trio of young women, the Dreamettes, gets them a job backing an R&B performer, James "Thunder" Early, establishes his own record label and starts wheeling and dealing. When Early flames out, Curtis makes the Dreamettes into headliners as the Dreams, but not before demoting their hefty big-voiced lead singer, Effie White, and putting the softer-voiced looker, Deena Jones, in front. Soon after, he fires Effie, sends her into a life of proud poverty, and takes Deena and the Dreams to the top. How long can Curtis stay there, and will Effie ever get her due?

Pinky is an awkward adolescent who starts work at a spa in the California desert. She becomes overly attached to fellow spa attendant, Millie when she becomes Millie's room-mate. Millie is a lonely outcast who desperately tries to win attention with constant up-beat chatter. They hang out at a bar owned by a strange pregnant artist and her has-been cowboy husband. After two emotional crises, the three women steal and trade personalities until they settle into a new family unit that seems to give each woman what she was searching for.

Ernest Borgnine plays Rex Page, an old man who is bitter about never becoming famous and having lived a life without any meaning. After suffering a stroke, he ends up in a nursing home staffed by Latin American immigrants. Put off by the situation, Rex focuses his energy on getting out, which places him at odds with the Latino workers. However, their relationship takes on new meaning when it is discovered that he once shook hands with Vicente Fernandez, a Mexican singer, producer and actor idolized throughout Latin culture. The employees soon begin to treat Rex like the celebrity he's always dreamed of being.

Paul left the police force after mistakenly killing his partner. Now he is a driver for rich guy who's daughter is kidnapped. He will use his skills to save the girl but he will also uncover secrets the family was hiding for years.