Octopus, Inc., a massive corporate conglomerate run by shrewd, cruel tycoon Rod McCain (Kevin Kline), purchases both a UK-based leisure company and also the failing London Marwood Zoo. To bring more business to the zoo, Octopus hires a new manager, Rollo Lee (John Cleese), who promptly comes up with a way to increase profits: do away with all of the animals except the ferocious ones. This new Fierce Creatures Policy shocks the Marwood zookeepers, led by the unendingly talkative Adrian "Bugsy" Malone (Sir Michael Palin). Eventually, Rod McCain's son Vince McCain (Kevin Kline) and up-and-coming business executive Willa Weston (Jamie Lee Curtis), take control of the zoo and revoke the Fierce Creatures Policy. Vince instead comes up with many underhanded, vicious schemes to attract customers: unauthorized celebrity endorsements; shoddy, overpriced zoo merchandise; and using robotic animals instead of real ones. However, Vince is also stealing from the zoo's funds, and when his father finds out, he rears to turn the zoo into a Japanese-owned golf course. Meanwhile, Willa has grown to love the zoo and its animals, and she and her newly-reformed love interest Rollo plot with the zookeepers to save the zoo from the McCains.