A Young Writer asks E.M. Forster to help him tell a story. They begin with Howard’s End. The novel’s sisters are transformed into a gay couple: vain Toby Darling and timid Eric Glass.
Toby’s play is bound for Broadway. He dumps Eric to pursue Adam, the play’s chilly star. When Adam rejects him he falls for Leo, a homeless rent boy who looks like Adam. The Young Writer warns Toby he’ll be dead within a year. Toby berates the cast and storms off. Forster tells the Writer he no longer needs his help to complete the story.
Eric befriends Walter Wilcox, a kindly neighbor. Walter tells Eric of the dying men he nursed in his country house during the AIDS epidemic. When Eric loses his rent controlled apartment Walter wills him the country house. Walter dies and his cold husband Henry Wilcox has the will burnt. But Henry warms to Walter, courting him and taking him to the house. The Ghosts of the men who died there welcome Eric. Half the audience falls apart.
We end part one with many questions. Will Eric grow a spine? Will Toby grow a heart? What of the play and the country house? And who is the mysterious Young Writer?