The Normal Heart

Directed by Emmy winner Ryan Murphy. Based on Larry Kramer’s Tony-winning play. Debuts May 25 at 9, e

Description

Academy Award® nominee Mark Ruffalo (“The Kids Are All Right”), Matt Bomer (“White Collar”), Taylor Kitsch (“Lone Survivor”), Emmy® winner Jim Parsons (“The Big Bang Theory”), Alfred Molina (“An Education”) and Academy Award® winner Julia Roberts star in a Ryan Murphy film, HBO Films’ presentation of THE NORMAL HEART.

Directed by Emmy® winner Ryan Murphy (“Eat Pray Love,” “Glee”) and written by Academy Award® nominee Larry Kramer (“Women in Love”), adapting his groundbreaking Tony Award-winning play of the same name, the drama tells the story of the onset of the HIV-AIDS crisis in New York City in the early 1980s, taking an unflinching look at the nation’s sexual politics as gay activists and their allies in the medical community fight to expose the truth about the burgeoning epidemic to a city and nation in denial.

Ruffalo portrays Ned Weeks, who witnesses first-hand a mysterious disease that has begun to claim the lives of many in his gay community and starts to seek answers. Matt Bomer plays Felix Turner, a reporter who becomes Ned’s lover. Taylor Kitsch plays Bruce Niles, a closeted investment banker who becomes a prominent AIDS activist. Jim Parsons plays gay activist Tommy Boatwright, reprising his role from the 2011 Broadway revival. Roberts plays physician Dr. Emma Brookner, a survivor of childhood polio who treats several of the earliest victims of HIV-AIDS.

Kramer’s play debuted at New York’s Public Theatre in 1985 and was revived in Los Angeles and London, and off-Broadway. The 2011 Broadway revival garnered five Tony nominations, winning for Best Revival, Best Featured Actor and Best Featured Actress.

THE NORMAL HEART debuts SUNDAY, MAY 25 at 9:00 p.m. (ET/PT), exclusively on HBO.