It's the middle of the Great Depression, and Morris Katz and his cousin, Albert, are broke. But that's all about to change when they head off to college on a mission from Morris' mother to find rich, unattractive Jewish girls to marry. The boys arrive on campus armed with a secret weapon: the poetry of Morris' cousin, Crip. Within a day Morris is courting Celeste Zimmerman, the frumpy heir to a movie theater franchise.

But then an Irish Catholic beauty falls under the spell of Crip's verse and goes gaga over Morris. She thinks he's a Jewish Communist revolutionary poet, and who is he to tell her otherwise? But is it happiness Morris truly wants - or money? And what will Mama Katz say?