American star Glenn Close will play Roy Cohn in a new adaptation of “Angels in America”. Image: AFP/Valerie Macon.
Glenn Close, Laura Linney, Patti LuPone, Paul Dano, Brian Tyree Henry and Jeremy O. Harris will headline the “Scenes from Angels in America” broadcast on Oct. 8 on Broadway.com’s YouTube channel to raise funds for the Foundation for AIDS Research or amfAR.
While Tony Kushner’s “Angels in America” is a two-act play, only seven scenes were selected by amfAR because of their “relevance to and resonance with our present emergency,” meaning the COVID-19 pandemic.
The scenes were recorded on iPhones at home by the 15 actors headlining the broadcast and helmed by director Ellie Heyman and creative director Paul Tate dePoo III. American composer Ellis Ludwig-Leone also took part in the Kushner adaptation.
Several actors and actresses will play the same “Angels in America” parts. Dano, Henry and Andrew Rannells will portray Prior Walter, a 30-year-old homosexual man who contracts the AIDS virus. Harper Pitt, a depressed housewife, will be played by Lois Smith and Vella Lovell.
This new adaptation will be followed by a live conversation with Kushner, Heyman and amfAR CEO Kevin Robert Frost. Many actors featured on the broadcast will also take part in the conversation regarding political activism and COVID-19 research. Viewers will also be able to make donations to amfAR.
“Angels is an intensely personal work that is so much more than just an AIDS play and, in this time of [COVID-19] and national unrest, its themes of racism and government failings make it as relevant and resonant today as it was when it was first performed 30 years ago,” said Kevin Robert Frost, in a press release. CC
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