The Normal Heart Page #5

Synopsis: 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.
Director(s): Ryan Murphy
Production: HBO Films
  Won 1 Golden Globe. Another 27 wins & 54 nominations.
 
IMDB:
7.9
Rotten Tomatoes:
94%
TV-MA
Year:
2014
132 min
Website
4,668 Views


we're gonna get money, research, grants.

Congress still hasn't appropriated a dime.

The Mayor's still... On and on!

Ned, when you go public, you have no right

to speak for this organization

unless we have approved

what you have to say in advance.

You know, in point of fact,

you aren't even an officer of this organization,

and you shouldn't be speaking for us at all!

Thank you for sharing that with me, Dick.

(THEME MUSIC PLAYING)

Why do you think the city has been so slow to

acknowledge and deal with this emergency?

(SCOFFS)

You're implying that the city's recognized

and acknowledged this emergency, Malcom.

- It has not.

- Why not, do you think?

'Cause the Mayor is gay and he's scared

shitless out of his panties it'll blow his cover.

(OBJECTS CLATTERING)

- MAN:
What did he say? Get off! Commercial.

- Are we still rolling?

(TONE BEEPS)

You can't tell me what to say

when I'm speaking for myself.

Bullshit. They all know you're one of us.

It is totally and politically incorrect

to call someone gay

who does not self-identify as being gay.

I know it's been that way forever,

but something different is going on here now.

We're dying.

The Mayor, he's a personal friend of yours.

You want him to appoint you a judge.

Do you have a little conflict of interest

going on here?

I told you. I sent him a memo.

- When?

- Through channels.

- When?

- He'll answer me.

When? There's 110 new cases this month!

Still, no meeting with our gay mayor.

No meeting with his gay assistant!

What, do I embarrass you, Bruce?

Yes. You do.

Yeah, you get more with honey

than with vinegar, babe.

God, no one's told me that one, Tommy.

No, obviously they haven't.

I don't believe that bullshit anyway.

We are in over our heads

with the patients we're trying to help.

Tommy, will you please read this report

out loud for Ned?

TOMMY:
"We have trained

25 crisis counselors

"to help the newly diagnosed

in whatever needs that they might have.

"We have 12 group leaders

"who meet with these counselors at least

once a week to go over their clients.

"There are now 17 volunteer social workers,

psychologists and/or psychiatrists.

"We helped draw up 75 wills last..."

Seventy-five, Bruce.

You used to be a fighter once.

- Did you like being in the Green Berets?

- Yes. I loved it.

Have you completely forgotten how to fight?

Don't tell me how to fight.

I just fight differently than you do.

- I haven't seen your way yet.

- No?

Bruce, Albert may be dying.

You son of a b*tch!

You say another word about him...

Relax.

And you,

you have no right being on this board unless

you put pressure on your friend, the Mayor.

That's why I asked you to join us

in the first place and you know it.

(PANTING)

- BEN:
No. No, I'm not gonna do that.

- Why not?

No, you get your free legal work from my firm.

I'm not gonna be on your board of directors.

NED:
It's only for the stationery.

You don't have to do a thing.

That is just an evasion.

If you thought this was a straight disease...

BEN:
It's got nothing to do with

you being gay.

NED:
What else does it have to do with?

One of these days I'm gonna get you to agree

that over 20 million men and women

in this country

don't require the services of a psychiatrist.

Look, try to understand.

You know, I read stuff. I see TV.

Guys in leather, chains, dresses, high heels.

You know, I say to myself, "This isn't Ned."

You know the media

always dramatizes the most extreme.

You guys have a dreadful image problem.

Well, that's why it's so important

to have people like you supporting us.

You already have your dignity.

BEN:
We better get to lunch.

I've got an important meeting.

Do you? How important?

I'm asking for your support.

In every area I consider important,

you have my support.

And the only area that I consider important,

I don't have your support at all.

In some place deep down inside you,

you still think I'm sick, don't you?

I think you've adjusted to life pretty well.

All things considered.

I saw how unhappy you were.

So were you!

You wound up going to shrinks, too.

We grew up side by side.

We both felt the same about Mom and Pop.

I'll agree to the fact that

I have any number of awful character traits,

but not to the fact that whatever awful things

they did to us made me sick and gay

while you stayed straight and healthy.

We don't all react the same way to the thing.

So you became a lawyer

and I became a writer.

Well, we have a difference of opinion

over theory.

But your theory

turns me into a man from Mars.

My theory doesn't do that to you.

Are you suggesting I did something wrong

in sending you into therapy so young?

I didn't know

you were gonna stay there forever.

I didn't think that I had done anything wrong

until you sent me there.

Ben, you mean more to me

than anyone in the whole world.

You always have.

Ben, you've gotta say it.

- Say what?

- I am the same as you.

Just say it. Say it.

No.

You're not.

I'm not gonna say it.

Every time I lose this fight, it hurts more.

I'm going home.

Oh, come on, Lemon.

I still love you.

Sarah still loves you. The cat still loves you.

This is not a joke!

You have my love, my legal advice,

my financial supervision.

I can't give you the courage

to stand up to me and say

you don't give a flying f***

about what I think!

Everybody's oppressed by somebody else

in some form or another.

Most of us learn to fight against it despite

people's opinions without the help of others.

Now stop trying to wring

some kind of admission of guilt out of me!

Agreeing that you were born

just the same as I was born

isn't gonna save your dying friends.

That is exactly what is going to save

my dying friends!

You make it sound like I'm the enemy!

I am beginning to think that

you and your straight world are our enemy!

I am furious with you

and every goddamn doctor

who made me feel it was sick to love a man!

I am trying to understand

why nobody gives a sh*t that we're dying!

$5 million for a house?

We can't even get 27 cents from the city.

I know 43 guys who have died

and you say it's my cause, not yours?

You still think I'm sick!

I simply cannot allow it

for one single second longer.

I will not speak to you again

until you accept me as your equal!

Your healthy equal! Your brother!

(SIGHS)

(DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES)

Yeah, be careful with that, boys.

That is a precious antique.

- Easy.

- Mmm-hmm.

Don't you think

we should put that in the grand salon?

Do we have a basement?

That's where it should go.

Bella, I think it's time

we moved your filthy mouth above ground.

- (LOUD KISSING)

- I'll decorate tomorrow.

Just shove it all in there the best you can.

(PURRS)

- Yeah, okay. Knock it off, both of you.

- (LAUGHING)

(KNOCKING AT DOOR)

Excuse me.

Yes? Hi.

Hi.

My name is Estelle,

and my best friend Harvey died last night.

We went everywhere together, you know?

Like Broadway and the Rockettes

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Larry Kramer

Larry Kramer (born June 25, 1935) is an American playwright, author, film producer, public health advocate, and LGBT rights activist. He began his career rewriting scripts while working for Columbia Pictures, which led him to London where he worked with United Artists. There he wrote the screenplay for the 1969 film Women in Love (1969) and earned an Academy Award nomination for his work. Kramer introduced a controversial and confrontational style in his novel Faggots (1978), which earned mixed reviews and emphatic denunciations from elements within the gay community for Kramer's one-sided portrayal of shallow, promiscuous gay relationships in the 1970s. Kramer witnessed the spread of the disease later known as Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) among his friends in 1980. He co-founded the Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC), which has become the world's largest private organization assisting people living with AIDS. Kramer grew frustrated with bureaucratic paralysis and the apathy of gay men to the AIDS crisis, and wished to engage in further action than the social services GMHC provided. He expressed his frustration by writing a play titled The Normal Heart, produced at The Public Theater in New York City in 1985. His political activism continued with the founding of the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) in 1987, an influential direct action protest organization with the aim of gaining more public action to fight the AIDS crisis. ACT UP has been widely credited with changing public health policy and the perception of people living with AIDS (PWAs), and with raising awareness of HIV and AIDS-related diseases. Kramer has been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for his play The Destiny of Me (1992), and he is a two-time recipient of the Obie Award. more…

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Submitted on August 05, 2018

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