Larry Kramer

Ned Weeks, a homosexual reporter, tries to start a political group to focus public attention and force government action on AIDS research

The Normal Heart

Larry Kramer's passionate, polemical drama is set during the early days of the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s. It follows the efforts of one man, while his friends are dying around him, to break through a conspiracy of silence, indifference and hostility from public officials and the gay community, and gain recognition for a disease that threatens to change everything. This definitive edition, with a revised text and new introductory material, was published twenty-five years after the play's 1986 British premiere at the Royal Court Theatre, London. A quarter of a century after that premiere, the play's prescience and its searing emotional power are beyond doubt. The play’s 2011 Broadway revival opened to an ecstatic critical reception, and won the Tony Award for Best Revival. It was adapted for television by HBO in 2014, with a cast includng Mark Ruffalo and Julia Roberts, and went on to win numerous awards, including the Emmy Award for Outstanding Television Movie.

Georgia Carr

I want to dedicate this (very short) review to all the gay men and women who were ignored in the 1980s, to all the inspirational individuals who fought so hard to be heard. This is for you. 

Larry Kramer did a truly remarkable thing when he wrote this play. I have so many feelings about it and none of them can be put into words. The Normal Heart is so very important that it's not even remotely plausible. The AIDs epidemic is extremely saddening and it continues to be heartbreaking, even in times of modern medicine and high-tech research. Larry Kramer makes the whole thing fit into a short play script which makes me bawl no matter how many times I read it. It's beautiful and very well done. 

Mr. Kramer, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. You are simply a fantastic human being and you will always be remembered for this.

savannah eden

Dramatizes the onset of the AIDS epidemic in New York City, the agonizing fight to get political and social recognition of it's problems, and the toll exacted on private lives. 2 acts, 16 scenes, 13 men, 1 woman, 1 setting.