Last night John and I went to a screening of the excellent new HBO screen adaptation of Larry Kramer’s classic play, The Normal Heart. Ryan Murphy directed, with an amazing all-star cast, including Mark Ruffalo, Matt Bomer, Jim Parsons, Taylor Kitsch, and Julia Roberts. The movie has clearly been made with enormous love for the original material and as can be expected, if you’ve ever seen The Normal Heart onstage, the story is completely involving and beyond heartbreaking.
I remember seeing the play in its original production at the Public Theater, in 1985, with Brad Davis playing Ned Weeks, the central, ferociously enraged character based on Larry Kramer; the action centers on the earliest, harrowing days of the AIDS crisis, and the founding of the Gay Mens Health Crisis. At that time, the mainstream media was pretty much refusing to even mention the epidemic, so the play became essential, as a source of not just mesmerizing drama, but sheer information. The set was scrawled with the rising numbers of the infected and the dead, and these numbers were constantly being updated. If you were a gay man, or anyone else, in NYC at that time, you had to see The Normal Heart.
The play has only grown in stature; there was a recent, award-winning revival on Broadway, where Joe Mantello played Ned brilliantly; he plays a supporting role in the HBO version, and he’s equally terrific. The Normal Heart doesn’t just seem like a necessary historical document, which would in itself be an achievement; it’s also a funny, sexy and galvanizing work.
The screening was very glamorous; John and I got there early, and footage from the red carpet was being screened inside the theater. There was a parade of handsome, talented, out gay actors, many with their spouses, including Matt Bomer, Jim Parsons, Jonathan Groff, Stephen Spinella and Denis O’Hare. Assembling this many happily gay stars would have been unthinkable, even a few short years ago. Heterosexuality was equally well represented, by the staggeringly attractive Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie (Pitt is also a producer on the movie.) Brad and Angelina can never break up, because how could either of them do any better?
John has known Larry Kramer for many years. In the movie, there’s a scene where a handful of GMHC volunteers are being ignored as they hand out fliers and ask for donations on the dock at Fire Island; in real life, John had been one of those volunteers. I’ve known Larry for a shorter time, and I’ve always been in awe of him. He’s become legendary, as a writer, a prophet and an activist. He’s also known for his outsize personality. When he came to see my play Jeffrey, I was terrified. But Larry’s response was wonderfully gratifying, because he enjoyed the play and, due to the play’s central romance, between a cater-waiter and an HIV-positive bartender, Larry told me that seeing the play made him want to go on a date.
Larry was at the screening last night, and as Ryan Murphy pointed out, it’s high time that he also appeared on a postage stamp. He’s an extraordinary man.
