When a film crew came to Waterford, Vermont,
they shot first and asked questions later.

A big-budget movie crew descends upon a quaint New England village, sowing a bumper crop of corruption, vanity and greed in David Mamet's State and Main. In the days that elapse before the cameras finally roll, money will change hands, careers will be jeopardized and love will bloom in the small-town soil.

Pity the poor film director (William H. Macy) who's arrived only to discover that the local mill - a crucial location for his movie, since it's titled "the old mill" - burned down in 1960. The idealistic screenwriter (Philip Seymour Hoffman) would rather pursue a pure-hearted local girl (Rebecca Pidgeon) than do a last-minute rewrite; the bimbo starlet (Sarah Jessica Parker) is now baulking at her contractual nude scene; a local teenager (Julia Stiles) is only too willing to exploit the indiscretions of the film's skirt-chasing star (Alec Baldwin) and of course, the power-wielding producer (David Paymer) is panicking about everything.