During the play, which is set in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, backgrounds of characters are discovered during a birthday party.
Harold celebrates his birthday party, thrown by six of his closest friends. He becomes increasingly morose about losing his youthful looks and claims that he no longer can attract cute young men.
"Cowboy", an attractive blond male prostitute who is "not too bright",is one of Harold's presents.
Alan is an unexpected party guest, Michael's allegedly straight college friend,who is in town and anxious to tell Michael something—but hesitant to do so when he sees the group.
His six closest friends are:
Michael is Harold's "friend-enemy",the host, and a lapsed Roman Catholic alcoholic undergoing psychoanalysis
Donald is a conflicted friend, who has moved from the city to spurn the homosexual "lifestyle".
Bernard is an African-American, who still pines for the wealthy white boy in the house, where his mother worked as a maid.
Emory is flamboyant and "effeminite".
Larry, an aggressively sexual homosexual, and Hank, who "passes" as straight, are a couple, who live together but disagree on the issue of monogamy.
During the party, one humor takes a nasty turn, as the nine men become increasingly inebriated. The party culminates in a game, where each man must call someone and tell him he loves him. Michael, believing that Alan has finally "outed" himself when he makes his call, realizes that Alan's wife is the caller when he grabs the phone away from Alan. The audience never learns what Alan intended to discuss with Michael in the end.
