Peter MacNicol

In Los Angeles, Quincy and his cousin Evan work at Spoil magazine. Quincy is an editor but Evan's job is never specified. Evan warns Quincy that Philip (known as Junior) is now in charge and plans layoffs. Philip calls Quincy to his office, but it is not to let him go. Because of Quincy's psychology degree, Philip believes Quincy is the right person to design procedures for laying people off without making them mad enough to take revenge. Quincy takes numerous books home where he is greeted by his girlfriend Helen's dog, who is still there for some reason. Quincy goes to Sig Sag to meet Helen, for their engagement party. But Helen wants to spend time apart. Quincy returns to work with a plan for firing people, and Philip hands him a list of the people to let go and tells Quincy to do it. After having to fire Sam, who thought he was coming in for a friendly chat, Quincy puts his name on the list of people to fire and walks out. Evan comes to Quincy's house because his mother was concerned about him. Quincy is a mess and so is the house. However, he has a big pile of papers on which he has attempted to write a breakup letter. That process is similar to being let go from a job. Spoil agrees to publish a book called Spoil's Breakup Handbook and before long it is climbing the newspaper's best-seller list. Quincy is making appearances at bookstores and on TV. Evan's girlfriend Nicky sees Quincy on TV while getting her hair done and realizes she wants to make a change. Afterward, she regrets what she has done. She had long hair but now looks like Halle Berry. Evan comes over but she won't let him see her so Evan goes to Quincy's house. Evan, thinking this means their relationship might be over, asks Quincy to meet with Nicky, telling him she has long hair. Quincy goes to Sig Sag where Evan and Nicky were supposed to meet but none of the girls with long hair are Nicky. But Quincy is attracted to the short-haired girl sitting next to him. Nicky has heard everything, and she decides to introduce herself as Mary. Quincy is supposed to say positive things about Evan, but he tells the truth about Evan instead, including some things that are not flattering. Quincy and Mary hit it off. Quincy tells Evan that Nicky never showed but he met a girl he likes. Also aware of Quincy's book is Rita, Philip's girlfriend. Philip wants to break up and on several occasions he and Quincy meet so Quincy can give him advice. Evan is still at Quincy's house, getting drunk and getting Helen's dog drunk. Rita shows up and, believing Evan is Quincy, says she knows Quincy is helping Philip break up with her. Rita indicates she wants a relationship with Quincy, who is a real man unlike the wimpy Philip, and when Evan wakes up he finds her phone number on the mirror. At Philip's place Rita is reading the book in the bathtub, and then the two have a conversation that doesn't go well. Evan goes to Nicky's place and when he sees her hair, says he doesn't like it. He says she stood him up but she says she didn't and that she went out with someone. Evan says he thought she wanted to break up while Nicky says she didn't want to. While massaging the flirtatious Mr. Lynch at work, Nicky tells co-worker Amy that Evan dumped her. Quincy doesn't know so Nicky continues to date him. However, when Evan asks for advice he says Nicky cut her hair. Quincy realizes Mary is Nicky but doesn't say anything. Helen is on a plane reading Quincy's book. Rita and Philip have naughty sex. After Heather Hadley's concert Nicky asks about Evan and Quincy says Evan and his girl broke up and Evan isn't happy. While Quincy and Nicky are making out, Quincy gets an angry phone call from Rita and Nicky hears the message. Believing Quincy is cheating on her, she gets mad. Quincy has no idea what the message is about. He visits her at work but is told she is not there. Evan and Rita, who still thinks he is Quincy, meet for sex. But she meets Philip in a post office since it is a public place where violence is less likely, and says she wants to get married. Quincy and Nicky meet in a park and admits who she is and Quincy says he didn't know, at first. At a surprise party for Quincy, everything goes wrong. Nicky didn't want to go but Amy insisted. Evan sees Nicky with Amy and hides. Helen is there, and she introduces herself to Nicky as Quincy's girlfriend. Then Rita also introduces herself. Evan, who now knows Quincy was dating Nicky, gets angry and leaves. Philip is in the hospital. The explanation is shown in flashbacks. As he and Rita plan for their wedding, Philip has a heart attack. When Evan and Quincy are visiting at the same time, Rita learns Evan is not Quincy but doesn't get mad. She wants to continue the relationship. Helen comes back to Quincy's place intending to resume their relationship. However, her dog now hates her. Later, she demands that Quincy have the dog put down. Quincy takes the dog to the animal shelter but is told that pugs don't usually get adopted. There are already several pugs. Quincy adopts them all and they chase Helen out of his house. Quincy wants to get back together with Nicky but learns she is taking a train to Portland. In fact, Nicky is taking Mr. Lynch on the train at the request of his daughter. Quincy narrowly misses seeing Nicky at the train station. Then he finds out what train she is on and starts chasing the train. Nicky pulls the emergency brake and the train stops, and they get on the train together, to Mr. Lynch's disappointment.

Two scientists, Dr. Elena Kinder (Kathleen Turner) and Dr. Heep (Christopher Lloyd), use genius-baby studies to fund BabyCo's theme park "Joyworld". BabyCo is the largest manufacturer of products for the baby and this research would help them understand the needs of babies are lot better. Kinder is also the CEO of BabyCo. According to Dr. Kinder's research on toddlers/babies, babies are born possessing vast, universal knowledge and speak a secret yet impossible-to-translate baby Pre-language called Babytalk. However, at age 2-3, the knowledge and language are lost as the babies "cross over" by learning how to speak human languages. All babies raised in Dr. Kinder's underground research facility were adopted from the orphanages Babyco supports. As they serve to filter out which babies should be raised under the Kinder Method and which babies shouldn't be raised under the Kinder Method. The selected babies are transformed into small geniuses through use of the Kinder Method, and then used in experiments to decipher this secret yet impossible-to-translate language used by the eight baby geniuses. Kinder says that she is spending $200 million every year on the orphanages with the sole purpose of expanding her pool of geniuses. One mischievous toddler, Sylvester (Leo, Gerry and Myles Fitzgerald) the only one of her toddlers raised via use of the superior version of the Kinder Method, nicknamed "Sly", makes repeated attempts to escape Dr. Kinder's research facility. The facility itself is well protected to prevent the smart toddlers from escaping. The facility is 25 stories underground for added protection and secrecy. Sylvester is only afraid of Dr Heep and falls in line as soon as he is confronted by him. Dr Heep had figured out the a baby playing on a musical instrument seems to produce noise, but a computer analysis of the sounds reveals a complex symphony worthy of a Beethoven. Also he finds that children drawing using crayons resemble an ancient language called Cuneiform. Dr Heep concludes that babies use this language and can understand each other. Cracking this secret would be the key to proving the superiority of the Kinder method of child upbringing. Sly's fellow geniuses believe that Kinder is trying to unleash a new world order where the babies would be the leaders, but Sly is not convinced and remains very skeptical of Kinder and her motives. He believes that Heep and Kinder are just wanting their own way to control the world through the babies. One night, Sylvester manages to get into a diaper truck and succeeds in getting out of the facility. The next morning, he is surprised to run into his long-lost normal twin brother, Whit, in a mall where Sly was hiding from Kinder's goons. Sly and Whit were born to a specifically selected surrogate mother and while Sly was taken to the research facility, Kinder arranged for Whit to be adopted by Robin, her niece. For the integrity of the experiment it was imperative that no one discovers that Sly and Whit are twins. A comparative evaluation will be done at the age of 6 to conclusively establish the superiority of the Kinder method. Sly is able to create complex shapes using Lego blocks even though he is only a baby. Meanwhile Whit is very naughty and plays pranks all the time. Although Sylvester and Whit share a telepathic bond, each has no idea of the other's existence. The guards from Dr. Kinder's research facility capture Whit, mistaking him for Sylvester, and take him back to Dr. Kinder's research facility. Sylvester is taken home by Whit's adopted mother, Robin (Kim Cattrall), who is Dr. Kinder's niece. Dan Bobbin is Robin's husband. Robin knows that Kinder has stolen all of Dan's research on babies and is now using it for her own personal profit. Dan and Robin run a Pre-school of their own, where Dan does his own research on babies. Dan was doing his own work on the secret baby language which Kinder did not know about. Dan video tapes Sly talking and suddenly realizes that he can understand what the babies are saying. Dr. Kinder (when Heep compares voice prints of Sly from last week with ones from the current baby) and the seven other baby-geniuses are shocked that Whit and Sylvester switched places at the mall, but Dr. Kinder becomes excited and begins to see this as an opportunity to do a cross evaluation on the twins. However, when she comes to Dan Bobbin's (Peter MacNicol) place, she realizes that Dan can understand babies. She realizes that if Sly tells Dan the truth about her keeping the twins separate, she could go to jail. After the attempts to retrieve Sylvester fail (her goons simulate a power outage in the area and enter the house as power company men, but Sly is able to defeat them), Dr. Kinder decides to move the research facility to Liechtenstein, and they have no choice but to make Whit be the only normal baby to be raised in this research facility until they can find a possible way to get Sylvester back to her research facility. The babies at Bobbin's place hypnotize Lenny (Dom DeLuise), the bus driver, to drive to Dr. Kinder's research facility. Once at the research facility, Sylvester goes to the control room to set the robots from the theme park on the lab scientists. When the Bobbins return home, their natural daughter Carrie (Gabrielle and Megan Robbins) tells her father that the children are in Dr. Kinder's research facility. At the end of the fight, Dr. Kinder captures Whit and takes him to the helicopter pad on the roof. Robin and Dan (Peter MacNicol) chase them to the roof, where Dr. Kinder reveals that she and Robin are not related and that Robin was adopted at age 2. After Dr. Kinder is arrested by the police, Sylvester and Whit come together on the roof to cross over. Dan and Robin adopt Sylvester. Dan is still curious of the secrets of life; but, as the twins have crossed over, they no longer know those secrets. Carrie, their sister, doesn't reveal anything (just giving her father a Sly smile) because adults are never meant to know their secrets.

The Royal National Gallery of London sends Mr. Bean, their most inept and detested employee, to California for the transfer of a painting in a desperate attempt to get rid of him.