Harrowing Stories Of 'How To Survive A Plague'

For the last in our series of conversations with Oscar-nominated filmmakers in the Best Documentary Feature category, we turn to How to Survive A Plague. The film documents the efforts of HIV/AIDS activists to improve availability of and access to AIDS drugs in the 1980s and '90s.

Employing substantial archival footage, the film highlights the dramatic protests in Washington and New York that ultimately helped wake a slumbering federal establishment — and led to policies and research that helped make AIDS a more manageable syndrome, if not yet a curable one.

David France, the director and producer of How to Survive a Plague, joins host Neal Conan from our studios in New York for a conversation about activism, awareness and healing during a period of mysterious medical crises among the nation's urban gay and lesbian population.