the 1974 comedy is about arthur, a middle-aged, egotistical hack writer who has been working on the opening line of a story involving a man's encounter with a squirrel for fifteen years, and edmond, the young fledgling writer he has hired as a secretary/collaborator. they soon discover that arthur's flamboyant redundancy clashes with edmond's mediocre melodramatic style as they each develop increasingly ridiculous scenarios for the story. they are joined by arthur's cleaning lady, also an aspiring writer, whose suggestions seem to be the most promising, but they too eventually bog down in banality.