Joan Rivers and Bergdorf Goodman

Mark Hopkinson, a jewelry salesman at Bergdorf Goodman, lavishes attention on his favorite client, Joan Rivers. That is, until he becomes sick with a series of diseases that, in 1988, are still dismissed as the gay plague, although the syndrome has a name: AIDS. When he becomes too ill to work, Joan Rivers confronts the staff at Bergdorf Goodman, demanding they give her his telephone number. It is only after she makes a scene on the sales floor that they relent just to get her out of the store. Mark Hopkinson, who quickly comes down with full-blown AIDS, is treated like a pariah by coworkers and family alike. Joan Rivers, although despondent over her husband’s suicide, her daughter’s subsequent refusal to speak to her, and setbacks in her career, is determined to help Mark Hopkinson. Their unlikely friendship centers on the existential anguish both feel at this point in their lives. Their relationship is one of extraordinary kindness at a time when the world is confronting a terrifying and deadly pestilence.