Meg Manning is the scatter-brained mother of bride-to-be Melissa, soon to wed phone company salesman Rod Schoenlieber. Dismayed by her daughter’s plans for a small intimate ceremony, Meg decides to host a surprise pre-wedding reception. Selecting the guests from one of Melissa’s discarded address books, Meg manages to assemble a combustible collection of characters, including sorority sister rivals, a southern belle and her unfaithful preppie husband, a burnt-out alcoholic journalist and his estranged wife, a British playboy, an accomplished interior designer, and an unaccomplished poet. To make matters worse, Meg also invites asthmatic Blair Brackman, Melissa’s therapist, who is in love with Melissa and intent on breaking up the nuptials that very night. Aided by a heavily-spiked rhubarb punch, chaos ensues in darkly hysterical fashion.

Reception is a comedic romp that explores the loves and longings of members of a generation that by all accounts should be happy and can’t understand why they aren’t.