Ambitious young musician and baseball fanatic Xander Lewin has a problem.  But what begins as a competition between two rivals - and two sexual orientations - soon develops into an adventurous friendship that challenges everyone's assumptions.

SYNOPSIS:

April 8, 1975. Boston Red Sox opening day. No one is more interested than Xander Lewin, music student and composer a "neo-mythic science fiction rock opera" Worlds in Collision which he wants to stage at Walden Auditorium. He watches a Shakespeare play there with men in the women's parts and visa versa, the vision of its lesbian director, Marnie. Xander strikes up a conversation with the sexy female stage manager, Rickie, who flirts with him an invites him to the cast party.

Xander attends the low-cost George Tech (GT, named for it's founder, "Something George".) As "Prof. Lewin", he secures the Walden Auditorium for Oct. 24 - if he can come up with the rental fee in time. Xander goes to the party and sees Marnie argue with Rickie. Rickie asks him to dance and they spend the night together at her place. Rickie looks at the clock and suddenly asks him to leave. A knock on the door. It's Marnie. She's Rickie's girlfriend. Xander quickly exits.

Xander plays the violin in the park to raise cash. His only fan is Nate, in his 70s, once a musician. Nate teaches him to watch the crowd and play accordingly. Rickie invites Xander to dinner which he accepts because his roommate, Rimshot, has eaten everything. But when he arrives he finds she's not alone: Marnie is there, too. Marnie explains that she and Rickie have a problem: It drives Marnie crazy when Rickie sleeps with other women. Their compromise is Rickie can sleep with him. Beginning tonight.

Xander and Rickie spend romantic days around Boston's landmarks and draw closer as lovers while a kind of truce evolves between Marnie and him. Rimshot asks how it's going with Rickie. When Xander hesitates, Rimshot assumes it's because of the three- way arrangement with Marnie, but Xander reveals it's actually because Rickie and he don't connect intellectually. Still, the sex is incredible.

Xander's pal Pat shows him where they can rehearse Worlds: in St. Agatha's, the

church across the street from GT. Marnie and Xander have a chance encounter and he reveals that he admired Marnie's work on the Shakespeare play. They discuss when they knew they were straight or gay. Xander asks if she ever considered "playing for the other team". Marnie tells an involved anecdote about a lesbian who got hit on the head with a baseball and, later went straight. But, she concludes, "Barring neural trauma, we are what we are."

Xander, Rickie, and Marnie go to a movie. Walking home, Xander and Marnie connect with their dissection of the film which annoys Rickie. Arriving at Coolidge Corner, Xander says that his late dad said that long ago people called it Coolidge's Corner and insisted he "remember" it. Rickie asks if it was true - Xander doesn't know. Still, he thinks his dad believed that if you're the only one who remembers something, then it only exists in your own tiny universe. But if even one other person remembers, that universe is infinitely expanded.

Marnie comes to a rehearsal of Worlds and offers to direct "a little." At a Red Sox game, Marnie and Xander both dive for a foul ball which bounces off Marnie's head and ends up spilling mustard all over Rickie. At St. Agatha's, Xander and Pat hear Father O'Connor's rich bass and want him in the show. Marnie, Rickie, and Xander hitchhike to Cape Cod. They are stuck until Marnie writes Ride Me on Xander's bare chest and makes him hold a sign saying 2 P Town. "Did I mention that P Town is the gay mecca?" ask Marnie. At a supposedly nude beach, a naked Xander and Rickie encounter a fully clothed Prof. from GT and his star pupil. They all pretend everything is normal.

As Marnie and Xander work together they are drawn closer. A conscience-torn Xander steals his mom's tuition check from the school to pay for the auditorium. The Sox tie up the World Series. On the night of the last game, Rickie confronts Marnie and Xander across the street from Fenway Park. Just as the Sox lose the series, she says she is dumping them both for another woman.

Xander's world comes crashing down. He loses the auditorium and has no place to mount his show. The Dean wants to see him, presumably to expel him for stealing. Marnie comes to his place and wordlessly leads him into the bedroom.

At the Dean's, it turns out that the recently deceased founder of the school was very impressed with him. That founder was Nathaniel George: Nate. Xander's tuition is paid for and he has money for the auditorium. But it's too late. Despondent he takes refuge at St. Agatha. Then Marnie shows up with a crew and equipment and transforms it into a makeshift performance space.

The show is a success and gets a long standing ovation. But the next morning Marnie is gone. She can't be something she's not: it's true she was bonked on the head - but it got better.

40 years later. Xander attends the wedding of Marnie and her bride, Regina. As he leaves, she hands him an envelope. In the cab, he sees she's given him an article about how Coolidge Corner was once Coolidge's Corner. She's added: If you're the only one who remembers something, then it only exists in your own tiny universe. But if even one other person remembers, that universe is infinitely expanded.

COOLIDGE'S CORNER