‘Normal Heart’ reprents the rare project load wh out gay talent - The Washgton Post

Contents:

• ‘NORMAL HEART’ REPRENTS THE RARE PROJECT LOAD WH OUT GAY TALENT
• ‘THE NORMAL HEART’ VIRTUAL READG SET WH STERLG K. BROWN, LAVERNE COX: “IT DON’T HAVE TO BE ABOUT ALL WHE GAY MEN”

‘NORMAL HEART’ REPRENTS THE RARE PROJECT LOAD WH OUT GAY TALENT

He’d left the wrtlg program at his high school and swched to the drama partment for his senr year, actg plays and hangg out a muny that clud one openly gay choreographer.

“He was the only gay person that I thought I’d ever known my life, ” Ruffalo said wh a lgh. “And the only gay person that I thought lived Virgia Beach at the time. ’ And that’s when he said, ‘I’m gay, and I’m love wh you, and I’m aaid you’re not gonna be my iend anymore.

As Ned Weeks Ryan Murphy‘s acclaimed HBO film of the Larry Kramer play “The Normal Heart, ” he rag at the forc — ernmental, societal and even wh the gay muny — that failed to speak up the early years of the AIDS epimic. Kramer (and his fictnal alter ego) may not have been well-liked durg those years the ’80s when he simply refed to shut up, but he was also right: The guy who screamed the loust and the longt was the one who forced actn at a time when the print wouldn’t even utter the word “AIDS, ” much of society blamed and ostracized the victims, and actn meant ath to an entire generatn of gay men. “He was spised for what he was dog, even the gay muny, but he vented morn activism, ” said Ruffalo, who his personal life actively mpaigns agast ackg and for marriage equaly, among other .

‘THE NORMAL HEART’ VIRTUAL READG SET WH STERLG K. BROWN, LAVERNE COX: “IT DON’T HAVE TO BE ABOUT ALL WHE GAY MEN”

There, the Wisns-born actor first beme aware of the plague sweepg the gay muny — and over and over, heard classmat at the Stella Adler Conservatory liver monologu om “The Normal Heart. ” (“The Normal Heart” tails the creatn of the Gay Men’s Health Crisis, which Kramer -found but left when he felt was too passive, lnchg the more nontatnal ACT UP.

“I said to Ryan, ‘Isn’t time that a gay actor plays this part?

It don’t matter if you’re straight or gay — I want the person I thk is right for the part, and that’s you.