In 1969, Elliot Tiber, an interior designer in Greenwich Village, New York, has to move back upstate to help his parents run their dilapidated Catskills motel, the El Monaco. Upon hearing that a planned music and arts festival has lost its permit from the neighboring town of Wallkill, Elliot calls producer Michael Lang at Woodstock Ventures to offer his family's motel to the promoters and generate business. Three weeks later, half a million people are on their way to his neighbor's farm.