Ritter plays Ed Chandler, a father who is fired from his job for taking time off to tend to his 16 year daughter Missy (Chlumsky), who is battling
cancer. Rather than accepting his dismissal, Ed decides to fight back. With the help of a
United States senator, he lobbies the
United States Congress and is the stimulus to passage of the
Family and Medical Leave Act. Because Missy's cancer is terminal, she is visited by the
Make-A-Wish Foundation and she wishes to go to the
White House and visit the
Oval Office and hopefully see President
Bill Clinton himself. Although Make-A-Wish is not so sure if they can grant her wish, in the end she does in fact get to visit the Oval Office and meet President Clinton himself in a surprise cameo appearance.
Missy is based on the merging of two women, Melissa Weaver and Dixie Yandle. Ed Chandler's character is very closely related to George Yandle, who with his wife Vicki, helped push the Family Medical Leave Act through Congress. Both George and Vicki were on stage with President
Bill Clinton (who in the movie plays himself in a cameo appearance) when the new law was signed