Plot

Buster Moon and his friends must persuade reclusive rock star Clay Calloway to join them for the opening of a new show.

With his theatrical company a local success, Buster Moon is dreaming of bigger things. Unfortunately, when a talent scout dismisses their work as inadequate for the big time, Buster is driven to prove her wrong, and he inspires his players to gamble everything to sneak into a talent audition in Redshore City for demanding entertainment mogul Jimmy Crystal. Against the odds, they catch his interest with some frantic creative improvisation and even more desperate lies, like personally knowing reclusive rock star Clay Calloway, who has not been seen in 15 years. Now faced with a tight production window with only a vague story idea and dire consequences for failure, Buster and his friends must all stretch their talents put on a show. The gang's challenges seem insurmountable, but each of them finds new inspirations and friends where they least expect them to pursue an artistic dream worthy of them.—Kenneth Chisholm (kchishol1970@gmail.com)

Having saved his theatre after the unexpected success of the singing competition in Sing (2016), genius, ever-optimistic impresario Buster Moon gets ready for an even more intriguing challenge. Supported by the motley crew of his loyal all-star performers, Buster has set his sights on taking dazzling Redshore City by storm with an out-of-this-world theatrical extravaganza at infamous billionaire Jimmy Crystal's Crystal Tower Theatre. However, there's a catch:To conquer the glamorous entertainment capital of the world, Moon must find global rock icon Clay Calloway and talk him into joining them. Can music mend a broken heart? Is Buster's team destined for grandeur?—Nick Riganas

Buster Moon (Matthew McConaughey) a koala who owns the New Moon Theater, is thriving in Calatonia with his newly rebuilt theater. Buster's crew includes Johnny (Taron Egerton) a teenage gorilla who left his father's ex-criminal gang to become a singer and pianist, Meena (Tori Kelly) a teenage elephant with an exquisite singing voice, Rosita (Reese Witherspoon) a pig who gave up her music dreams to become a devoted housewife and mother of 25 piglets, but who now does both, Gunter (Nick Kroll) a passionate dancing pig and Rosita's dance partner, and Miss Crawly (Garth Jennings) an elderly iguana with a glass eye who works as Buster's assistant. Ash (Scarlett Johansson) a porcupine punk rock guitarist, performs as a soloist at a nightclub.

The crew works together to put on dazzling musicals (like "Alice in Wonderland") that have a successful run at the theater.

The crew is nervous as they know that the best talent scout in the business, Suki Lane, is in audience. Miss Crawly keeps an eye on Suki and counts 9 smiles, 2 belly laughs and 5 chuckles. Buster is hopeful that Suki likes the show. They are disappointed when the crew fails to impress Suki Lane (Chelsea Peretti) a talent scout dog working at Crystal Entertainment. Suki tells Buster he would not make it in nearby Redshore City where her boss Jimmy is holding auditions. Suki says that the show is good for a local theater but would never make it in the big leagues. Buster is distraught as this was his chance to increase the impact of his theater to a much bigger audience.

Encouraged by Nana Noodleman (Jennifer Saunders) a sheep and a famous singer, who asks him to keep fighting on, Buster reunites his crew, and they head off to the city to make an impression. Ash also joins after she quits her club when she finds out that she is being paid less than the other acts in the club. Meena is worried that the scout did not like their show and Gunter pitches Buster the idea of a space themed musical.

They are denied entry into Crystal Entertainment but manage to sneak in (disguised as janitor staff) for an audition with entertainment mogul wolf Jimmy Crystal (Bobby Cannavale) a wolf and media owner who runs Crystal Entertainment. As Jimmy is uninterested in Buster's original show pitch, he asks them to vacate the stage. Gunter suggests a space-themed sci-fi musical that features songs from Clay Calloway (Bono) a white-maned aged lion, a legendary rock star lion who has not been seen in 15 years after his wife Ruby died. Intrigued and assuming Clay will be a part of the show (and has given permission to use his songs as part of the show), Jimmy green-lights it. Moon has 3 weeks to conduct the first show. Jimmy provides the entire crew rooms at his hotel, and support in the form of set designers and choreographers, but also threatens to throw Buster off the roof, if he does anything to make him look bad.

Buster writes the story and designs the stage concept. Rosita plays an astronaut looking for a missing space explorer. Together with her trusty robot, Gunter, she follows the trail across 4 planets, one each of war, of love, of despair and of joy. And each planet will have its own spectacular musical number. The ending is not clear yet.

Miss Crawly finds where Clay lives and goes to visit him, but he scares her away with a series of booby traps. During production, Rosita (who has been cast as the star of the show) develops a fear of heights, prompting Buster to give Rosita's role to Jimmy's daughter, Porsha (Halsey) a spoiled daughter of Jimmy, on his insistence while Rosita is assigned to a minor role. Rosita pretends to be OK in front of Buster, but secretly cries when she is alone.

Johnny has been assigned to work with top choreographer proboscis monkey Klaus Kickenklober (Adam Buxton) (a strict dance instructor), but his harsh teaching methods leave Johnny unable to learn effectively. Johnny later comes across a street dancer lynx named Nooshy (Letitia Wright), who agrees to help him out to regain his confidence.

Meena has been cast in a romantic scene with Darius (Eric André), an egocentric actor yak. Having never been in love, Meena is unable to get the feelings across during their scene. She later meets and falls in love with an ice cream vendor elephant named Alfonso (Pharrell Williams) an elephant and ice cream vendor.

Rosita's husband Norman comes to Redshore city with their piglets. Jimmy eventually finds out that Buster never contacted Clay about the show and threatens to harm Buster if he does not deliver.

Ash and Buster visit Clay instead to convince him to be in the show. He refuses at first. Ash asks Buster to return to the production as she needs more time with Clay. Clay is her idol, and she won't leave him alone like this. Ash convinces Clay that a life of isolation is not what his wife Ruby would have wanted for him.

Back at the theater, Buster asks Porsha to switch roles with Rosita, as Porsha's acting skills are poor. Porsha misinterprets this as Buster firing her and runs off. An outraged Jimmy nearly drops Buster off his penthouse roof after news of the supposed firing is broadcast on television before locking him in a closet. Suki later frees Buster and warns him to leave Redshore City before Jimmy can kill him.

Ash arrives at their crew hotel room with the crew and Clay, who advises Buster not to run and hide as he did. Buster decides to have the cast and crew put on the show that night behind Jimmy's back after he witnesses Jimmy insulting him and his friends on television. Porsha rejoins the show when Miss Crawly gets her back, Johnny calls his dad and his gang to come over and keep Jimmy and his bodyguards at bay, and Rosita calls her husband Norman to let their children distract security. Buster broadcasts a message to invite an audience to see their show. He says the show features Clay Calloway and is completely free. The theatre fills up in no time.

During the show, a jealous Klaus takes the place of Johnny's performance partner to undermine his number, but Johnny defeats Klaus with encouragement from Nooshy and the other dancers, finally earning Klaus' respect. Porsha performs a high energy song and dance number, standing up to her angry father.

Meena visualizes Darius as Alfonso, and successfully performs a romantic duet with him. In a last attempt to stop the show, Jimmy enters the theatre, captures Buster and takes him to the top of the stage. He drops Buster off a high catwalk, which forces Rosita to overcome her fear of heights to save Buster.

When the time comes for Clay to take the stage, he claims that he is not ready yet. Ash leads the crowd in a rendition of one of Clay's songs, giving him the courage to perform. After the curtain call, Jimmy tries to take credit for the show but is arrested by the police for attempting to kill Buster.

Just as Buster and his friends begin to return home the following morning, Suki stops them and tells them that a major theater wants to put on their show. As the cast puts on its first official performance, Buster watches from the VIP section, proud to have succeeded in Redshore City.