Plot: Tim Conrad feels he is on the verge of achieving everything he wants in life. He has a good shot at getting the promotion from analyst to executive at Fender Financial, an equity firm that specializes in distressed assets. Everything else he wants is predicated on getting that promotion. He has overextended himself financially in trying to act the success, and he feels he needs one last impressive thing in his life to convince his art gallery curator girlfriend Julie to marry him. Tim's shot at that promotion increases when he proposes to his boss Lance Fender a creative way to obtain the account of managing the personal assets of Swiss eccentric multimillionaire Martin Mueller. Beyond actually wooing Mueller, Tim has one last hurdle to overcome for the promotion: he has to impress Fender at his next regular dinner for the executives. Those dinners entail each executive bringing an "idiot" to dinner to be able to make fun of them without them even knowing they are the butt of jokes, with the biggest idiot earning the most brownie points for his/her respective executive. Initially, Tim, who tells Julie of the dinner, plans on making an excuse to Fender so as not to attend the dinner. However, he changes his mind when he literally runs into who he thinks is the perfect idiot, Barry Speck, an IRS analyst by day, and a mouse taxidermist - the finished creations which he places in miniature dioramas - by night. Barry ends up being a sweet but socially unaware man. Beyond Julie finding the thought of Tim attending the dinner abhorrent, Tim may find that his association with Barry has the exact opposite of its intended effect as Barry causes one catastrophe after another in Tim's life, all in Barry's effort to help his new friend.
Alternative Plot: Tim (Paul Rudd) a rising executive, works for a boss who hosts a monthly event in which the guest who brings the biggest buffoon gets a career boost. Though he declines the invitation at first, he changes his mind when he meets Barry (Steve Carell), a man who builds dioramas using stuffed mice. The scheme backfires when Barry's blundering good intentions send Tim's life into a downward spiral, threatening a major business deal and possibly scuttling Tim's romantic relationship.
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