‘NORMAL HEART’ ZEROS IN ON THE TRAGEDY OF AIDS

“I think our culture is hung up on the fact that when someone is sick, you kind of shun them away because they represent everything that you don’t want to think about.”

The words are tinged with anger because the man who spoke them, actor Douglas Roberts, is immersed in the most heartbreaking role of his youthful career. Roberts, 24, is playing Ned Weeks in Larry Kramer’s angry love story, “The Normal Heart,” a semi-autobiographical play that brings the AIDS issue into focus as personal tragedy and political embarrassment.

It opened last night at the North Coast Repertory Theatre in Solana Beach.

Director Olive Blakistone, speaking last week, defended her risky season opener. “Working in the theater, I’ve met a number of people who are gay and who have experienced losing close friends with AIDS,” she said. “I decided that not only was (‘The Normal Heart’) a good script, but it needed to be done.”

Last year, North Coast’s determined artistic director produced “Duet for One,” a moving play about a woman dealing with multiple sclerosis that won raves from local critics and scared away most of the theater’s regular patrons.

But Blakistone isn’t letting box office worries stop her from staging the local premiere of “The Normal Heart.” She sees it not only as good theater--Kramer’s 1984 drama has received glowing praise in other cities--but also as a sane voice among widespread ignorance, fear and hysteria about AIDS.

“I’m hoping that because I have such a really splendid cast that the word will spread once people see it,” she said.

Roberts’ character, Ned (based on Kramer’s own life), is a short-fused political activist working in early 1981 to alert the gay community to the threat of a disease first known as Kaposi’s sarcoma and, later, as acquired immune deficiency syndrome. The play exposes the painfully slow response of New York politicians, medical authorities and even the gay community itself to this urgent issue.

What gives the drama its bite is the love story Kramer has woven in with the political themes. Ned falls in love--for the first time in his life--with a writer named Felix (played by Bruce McKenzie) who eventually discovers that he has AIDS.

“It breaks my heart,” Roberts said, speaking for his character and himself as an actor. “The play is good because it has universal themes of losing someone that you love--of death and dying.”

Because he is not gay, and because he has never had any experience with AIDS, Roberts and several other members of the cast spent a lot of time doing research, visiting the San Diego AIDS Project in Hillcrest and recruiting volunteer Glen Miller as an adviser to the production.

A year ago, Miller’s lover died of AIDS. Now the AIDS Project volunteer is suffering from the disease himself and, according to Roberts, was pleased to be asked to help put the edge of reality on North Coast’s production.

With Ned-like indignation, Roberts talked about what he has learned.

“The horror stories are just incredible about families disowning their son because, first of all, they found out he is gay and, second of all, because he has AIDS, and so therefore the son has absolutely no one to go to,” Roberts said. “The lover sometimes leaves, sometimes doesn’t--it’s an incredible responsibility to take care of somebody who is dying, slowly.

“They get fired from their jobs, they get evicted unless they own their own home, they get their health insurance canceled. I mean, the world just basically turns off.

“We’re all on the same planet, for Christ’s sake, why do we have to be mean to each other? There are the compassionate few that do (care), but the public as a whole--how they look at the issue and turn off of it and say, ‘Well, yeah, it’s God’s way of getting rid of gay people’--it’s just infuriating to me!”

That early shrug-off has now been overshadowed by the fact that AIDS is wiping out entire villages in Africa, where it is called “The Horror,” Blakistone said, and that, while numbers are increasing across the boards, the rate of this increase is higher among heterosexuals in this country than among gays.

“I have a commitment from two different doctors . . . who are involved in (AIDS) research, who will come and conduct talk-back sessions with the audience on the five Friday nights following the opening production,” Blakistone said. She also will have information pamphlets from the AIDS Project placed in the lobby and will hold a benefit performance Nov. 5 for the Gay Assistance Fund, which sponsors a live-in care center for AIDS victims in San Diego.

Roberts has already become more personally involved in the issue. He described his admiration for Miller, whose willingness to talk about his own personal pain and loss has been invaluable.

“When he came (to rehearsal) I thought, ‘God, I really hope that I’m doing this right.’ There is one part where I was up on the stage and I thought, ‘I’m lying, I’m lying--there’s somebody out there who has been going through this and I’m not doing it the way it should be done.’ I know I can get there, though. . . . We’ve come miles since he came.”

As for Miller’s real tragedy, Roberts said: “He is not at all filled with self-pity or anything. He is fighting, and he is giving his life because he works for the AIDS Project. . . . I want to say, if there is anything I can do, just call on me, I will do anything possible. Then I thought, well, doing a good show might be the thing to do--it might be the greatest gift. Maybe this play will save somebody’s life.”