Fourteen-year-old Vivian Abromowitz's family are penniless nomads, moving from one cheap apartment to another in Beverly Hills in 1976, so that Vivian (Natasha Lyonne) and her brothers can attend the city's prestigious Beverly Hills Unified School District. Their father, Murray (Alan Arkin), is a divorced 65-year-old who refuses to retire, working as an unsuccessful Oldsmobile salesman whose cars are selling poorly due in large part to the Energy crisis of the time.