Act I

Darlene Purvis, one of the original trio of the The Honky Tonk Angels, stayed in Nashville after her friends and fellow singers Angela Bodine and Sue Ellen Smith Barney Fife went home after fulfilling their dreams of singing great country songs in Nashville. Those two angels knew that they weren’t destined to become big stars, but they believed that Darlene had all the star quality to “make it” as the greatest woman singer since Patsy Cline—and she does!

It’s the opening night of Darlene’s world tour. She kicks off her opening number “I Feel Lucky,” but her luck runs out—the huge mirror ball above her comes crashing down!

Her death and birthday coincide with Halloween night! A spooky set up, right?

On the first anniversary of Darlene’s demise and her birthday, on Halloween night, the two still-grieving angels Angela and Sue Ellen decide to return to the run-down club where they first performed together (appropriately named Honky Tonk Heaven) and put on a show in honor of Darlene. This time the ladies bring their significant others. Sue Ellen brings her boyfriend. A dimwitted, semi-retired professional wrestler and wannabe country star, Cornell Crawford is known by his fans as The Rhinestone Cowboy. Angela brings her beer-drinking, truck-driving, rough and insensitive husband Bubba Bodine.

When they get to Nashville, they go to the Honky Tonk Heaven club and meet Darlene’s biggest fan, the flamboyant and energetic Little Jimmy Timmy.

Through songs and comedic dialogue, each of the characters reveal themselves. Songs include “You’re The Reason Our Kids Are Ugly” (Angela and Bubba), “A Boy Named Sue” (Little Jimmy Timmy), “Rhinestone Cowboy” (Cornell), and “He’s Got A Tape Deck In His Tractor” (Sue Ellen).

But the mystery begins when Darlene returns as a ghostly spirit who (of course) also sings. The surprise is that BUBBA is the only one who is psychically sensitive enough to see her and speak to her. The end of the act hilariously ends with Darlene leading the audience in a singalong of “Ghostbusters!”

Act II

In spite of Bubba’s madness, the group goes ahead with their Halloween and Darlene’s birthday-and-death-day celebration, with Little Jimmy Timmy in a black light skeleton costume singing and dancing to “The Devil Went Down To Georgia”. Then the group does an impersonator segment with Sue Ellen singing “Jolene” as Dolly Parton. She is then joined onstage by Cornell as Kenny Rogers, and they sing “Islands in the Stream”. In middle of their number, Little Jimmy Timmy (who has developed a “fan crush” on Cornell) enters as a second “Dolly” in drag. When the song ends, Sue Ellen and Little Jimmy Timmy square off for a wrestling match, performing Loretta Lyn’s classic “You Ain’t Woman Enough To Take My Man”. The show ends with an awkward Bubba as Billy Ray Cyrus performing “Achy Breaky Heart”. He is joined by the other two guys and do a partial Chippendale-type striptease to the song!

After their show they are all upset with Bubba for ruining the finale because he is still being haunted by Darlene, who is still speaking to Bubba. He talks with her in a scene in which everyone can only hear Bubba’s responses. The others believe that Bubba has gone completely mad.

Everybody believes that Bubba is crazy except Little Jimmy Timmy, who decides that Darlene’s spirit could indeed be present, and so he gets everyone to participate in a wild seance.

Throughout the show a rickety old furnace in the club rumbles in disrepair. At the end of the séance, it explodes and the whole cast “passes away” to the real Honky Tonk Heaven where everyone meets Darlene. They sing a rousing version of “I’ll Fly Away”. Finally, everyone realizes that, underneath his rough exterior, Bubba is actually a very sensitive guy with a heart of gold. So in the end, Bubba’s sensitivity is Bubba’s revenge—“Vengeance is mine saith the Bubba”.

But wait—there’s a twist! This story, it turns out, is actually a fabrication of Bubba’s imagination, made to teach everyone to give all old redneck Bubba’s everywhere a hug, because they can be sensitive human beings too. He tells all to “Hug A Bubba Everyday” and then leads everyone (and the audience) in the celebration of our common humanity with the song “Everyone Is Beautiful”. So in the end—the real end—the moral is “Don’t Judge A Book By Its Cover,” as well as a message of tolerance for all.