In the early 1960s Kay (Garr), a single mother, inherits a run-down diner in a small town in Washington State and gladly moves from Chicago to run it, taking her young son and daughter and her mentally unstable Aunt Zena (MacLaine), a former magician and vaudevillian who teaches the children magic tricks. Under her instruction they attempt to take revenge on the curmudgeonly neighbor (Schiavelli) who beat them with a belt for stealing his apples, by faking an apparition of an angry ghost. The trick goes awry and he thinks he has had a vision of an angel. Influenced by the tensions of the Cuban Missile Crisis, crowds flock to the town, making the diner prosper. The children feel very guilty, but the international crisis, the spiritual paradox of the fake vision, and Zena's stroke are all happily resolved in the finale of the film.[2][3]
