The Institute

Disillusioned with the post-college, 9 to 5 grind, Bridget Foster finds herself depressed and out of answers. She's just quit her first "soul-sucking, adult" job, only to be met with months of unemployment, upcoming wedding plans, and student loan payments, right around the corner. What's a girl to do when nothing makes sense, and every option looks equally bleak? Across town, her friend, Donnie isn't fairing much better. Working a dead-end security job at the local foodstamp office, overweight, and living at home with his overbearing mother, and three younger sisters, Donnie finds himself a college graduate who is equally, just as lost and unhappy as his friend. They both need a miracle, and fast! But who could have predicted that their miracle would come in the form of Bridget's old neighborhood friend, and town screw-up, Tobey Wopat. Having left their hometown, disgraced, five years earlier, after driving a busload of emotionally challenged teens off a bridge, Tobey Wopat has found a new home and life in Ponoma, Utah. Now working as an orderly at a mental institution, he's finally found a way to outrun his past, (or so he thinks). After hearing of his friend's bad luck with employment prospects back home, Wopat writes Bridget, inviting her to join him in Ponoma, for a few months in an intern program. Though surprised to hear from Wopat, and somewhat reluctant, Bridget, decides she has nothing to lose, and sees this as a chance to clear her head and gain new perspective. After secretly signing Donnie up as well, they are both accepted into the program, and leave for Ponoma. Hilarity and insanity ensues, as Bridget and Donnie, seek to find themselves, and survive among the quirky, Institute staff and residents, (and a potential spirit and thugs, to boot). Could a trip to an insane asylum provide all the clarity they need? Maybe...if they don't get themselves killed first!