Commitment to Life

“No story has the epic sweep, heart wrenching drama, and galvanizing emotion as that of the AIDS crisis in Los Angeles. It’s a story of how people from all walks of life came together to show love to the sick and the dying when our own government turned its back on them. It’s a story of how we organized and built critical infrastructure to take care of and protect each other. It’s about how BIPOC communities who were disproportionately affected demanded to be seen and created their own institutions. It’s about how members of the Hollywood community used their privilege and access to power to raise money and fight the stigma associated with AIDS. And most of all, it’s about how the LGBTQ+ community found its voice and showed the world the best of who we are as a people.” — Jeffrey Schwarz

DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT

When I came out to my mom in the early 1990s, the first thing she said to me was, “Please don’t get sick.” At that time, the AIDS epidemic was raging, and tens of thousands of people around the world had already been lost. AIDS was still a death sentence, and individuals with HIV/AIDS faced rampant discrimination, isolation, and stigma. For me, the thrill of coming out was intertwined with fear and anxiety about the virus.

After moving to Los Angeles in 1995, I attended my first AIDS Walk. I saw thousands of people marching to support those living with HIV as well as honor loved ones taken too soon. I learned about AIDS Project Los Angeles and the critical role this organization played from the earliest days of the epidemic. Seeing how the Los Angeles community rose to meet the challenge of HIV/AIDS was empowering and filled me with pride about how far we’ve come. It was around this time that advances in treatment made it possible for those infected with HIV to lead healthy, productive lives. The tide was beginning to turn, and no city responded to the crisis quite like Los Angeles did.

As a filmmaker, I have told stories about the LGBTQ+ community through the lives of some of its trailblazers. But no story has the epic sweep, heart wrenching drama, and galvanizing emotion as that of the AIDS crisis in Los Angeles. It’s a story of how people from all walks of life came together to show love to the sick and the dying when our own government turned its back on them. It’s a story of how we organized and built critical infrastructure to take care of and protect each other. It’s about how BIPOC communities who were disproportionately affected demanded to be seen and created their own institutions. It’s about how members of the Hollywood community used their privilege and access to power to raise money and fight the stigma associated with AIDS. And most of all, it’s about how the LGBTQ+ community found its voice and showed the world the best of who we are as a people.

Commitment to Life profiles some of the courageous individuals who stepped forward in a fight for survival. People like Nancy Cole, one of the founders of AIDS Project Los Angeles, who helped provide vital services in those dark early days and was one of the first women in LA to go public about having AIDS. Or Phill Wilson, who, when he and his partner Chris Brownlie were faced with their own HIV diagnosis, became full time activists and helped defeat the notorious Prop 64, which would have placed people with HIV in internment camps. There’s Brenda Frieberg, who when both of her sons were diagnosed with AIDS, traveled to Washington to lobby for access to drugs that could save their lives. Or Jewel Thais-Williams, owner of Catch One disco, who helped start the Minority AIDS Project to address the needs of the African-American community. And there was Elizabeth Taylor, who used her celebrity to advocate for people with AIDS and inspired the Hollywood community to do the same.

Forty years after the start of the epidemic, there is still no cure for HIV. Our young people are vulnerable to infection, and we are still facing stigma and silence around HIV. Commitment to Life will help to energize and engage a new generation by bringing our history to life. It will show them how anyone can make a difference and inspire them to get into the fight, because AIDS is not over.

In the early 1980s, a young doctor at UCLA reported a strange immune disorder among gay men — the world’s first warning sign of the epidemic to come. In the decades that followed, AIDS would ravage the city and kill nearly forty million people globally. Within Los Angeles, it would trigger a fight for survival and propel disenfranchised communities to demand — and secure — political power. While the history of HIV/AIDS in cities like New York and San Francisco may be more familiar, no city responded quite like Los Angeles.

Commitment to Life documents the story of Los Angeles’ central — and oft-unsung — role in fighting a global epidemic. As HIV/AIDS began to devastate Los Angeles, an intrepid group of people living with HIV/AIDS, doctors, movie stars, studio moguls and activists came together to change the path of the epidemic and how the world saw it. When New York activists took to the streets, Los Angeles took to the screens. The city responded to the epidemic by crafting a human element, and changing the culture the best way it knows how — through story. L.A. helped provide vital information, give a face to the disease, and craft a narrative that would resonate far from the coast.

“No story has the epic sweep, heart wrenching drama, and galvanizing emotion as that of the AIDS crisis in Los Angeles. It’s a story of how people from all walks of life came together to show love to the sick and the dying when our own government turned its back on them. It’s a story of how we organized and built critical infrastructure to take care of and protect each other. It’s about how BIPOC communities who were disproportionately affected demanded to be seen and created their own institutions. It’s about how members of the Hollywood community used their privilege and access to power to raise money and fight the stigma associated with AIDS. And most of all, it’s about how the LGBTQ+ community found its voice and showed the world the best of who we are as a people.” — Jeffrey Schwarz

DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT

When I came out to my mom in the early 1990s, the first thing she said to me was, “Please don’t get sick.” At that time, the AIDS epidemic was raging, and tens of thousands of people around the world had already been lost. AIDS was still a death sentence, and individuals with HIV/AIDS faced rampant discrimination, isolation, and stigma. For me, the thrill of coming out was intertwined with fear and anxiety about the virus.

After moving to Los Angeles in 1995, I attended my first AIDS Walk. I saw thousands of people marching to support those living with HIV as well as honor loved ones taken too soon. I learned about AIDS Project Los Angeles and the critical role this organization played from the earliest days of the epidemic. Seeing how the Los Angeles community rose to meet the challenge of HIV/AIDS was empowering and filled me with pride about how far we’ve come. It was around this time that advances in treatment made it possible for those infected with HIV to lead healthy, productive lives. The tide was beginning to turn, and no city responded to the crisis quite like Los Angeles did.

As a filmmaker, I have told stories about the LGBTQ+ community through the lives of some of its trailblazers. But no story has the epic sweep, heart wrenching drama, and galvanizing emotion as that of the AIDS crisis in Los Angeles. It’s a story of how people from all walks of life came together to show love to the sick and the dying when our own government turned its back on them. It’s a story of how we organized and built critical infrastructure to take care of and protect each other. It’s about how BIPOC communities who were disproportionately affected demanded to be seen and created their own institutions. It’s about how members of the Hollywood community used their privilege and access to power to raise money and fight the stigma associated with AIDS. And most of all, it’s about how the LGBTQ+ community found its voice and showed the world the best of who we are as a people.

Commitment to Life profiles some of the courageous individuals who stepped forward in a fight for survival. People like Nancy Cole, one of the founders of AIDS Project Los Angeles, who helped provide vital services in those dark early days and was one of the first women in LA to go public about having AIDS. Or Phill Wilson, who, when he and his partner Chris Brownlie were faced with their own HIV diagnosis, became full time activists and helped defeat the notorious Prop 64, which would have placed people with HIV in internment camps. There’s Brenda Frieberg, who when both of her sons were diagnosed with AIDS, traveled to Washington to lobby for access to drugs that could save their lives. Or Jewel Thais-Williams, owner of Catch One disco, who helped start the Minority AIDS Project to address the needs of the African-American community. And there was Elizabeth Taylor, who used her celebrity to advocate for people with AIDS and inspired the Hollywood community to do the same.

Forty years after the start of the epidemic, there is still no cure for HIV. Our young people are vulnerable to infection, and we are still facing stigma and silence around HIV. Commitment to Life will help to energize and engage a new generation by bringing our history to life. It will show them how anyone can make a difference and inspire them to get into the fight, because AIDS is not over.

And in the center of the storm was AIDS Project Los Angeles, a committed group of activists who helped care for the sick and dying, while at the same time lobbied those in Hollywood to contribute to the fight. APLA brought together A-list stars like Elizabeth Taylor and people with AIDS to provide resources for care, research and activism. APLA’s star-studded Commitment to Life gala, the first major fundraiser for AIDS, was instrumental in focusing Hollywood’s energy on defeating not only the disease but the stigma surrounding it. AIDS Walk Los Angeles, the first of its kind, brought thousands of people into the streets in a public display of support for people living with AIDS.

Using newly filmed interviews, never-before-seen clips from APLA’s gala fundraising events, rare archival footage, and long-forgotten PSAs, Commitment to Life reconstructs the virus’ devastating march and the city that rose up to fight it. Like the virus itself, the story winds through gated communities and neighborhoods of color, government offices and university labs, hospital suites and studio soundstages to tell a story of courage and sacrifice — as well as one of discrimination and unequal treatment.

Today, Los Angeles is a model for the nation — a pioneer in rights and protections, a leader in identification and treatment, a sprawling, multilingual, community-specific, intersectional network of care. Commitment to Life shows the world how it was done, and the important work still to come.

PRODUCER/DIRECTOR
Jeffrey Schwarz

PRODUCER
Aimée Flaherty

EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS
Ron Sylvester

CO-PRODUCER
Taki Oldham

COMPOSER
Allyson Newman
With the Participation of
Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeless

CINEMATOGRAPHER
Adam Jason Finmann

EDITOR
Jeffrey Schwarz

“…intensely moving and inspiring…”
— Film Threat

“…an affecting, emotional oral history…”
— Bay Area Reporter

“…a reminder that the struggle is not over…”
— Eye for Film

“…a brilliant and bracing account…”
— GED Magazine

For public screening inquiries:
Jeffrey Winter / The Film Collaborative
jeffrey (at) thefilmcollaborative (dot) org

For official presskit & stills:
thefilmcollaborative.org/films/commitmenttolife

For all other inquiries:
jeffrey (at) automatpictures (dot) com