Stars all of the same actors from the original play. Producer/author Mart Crowley insisted that the entire original cast of the off-Broadway production be used in the film.
Cliff Gorman and his wife took care of Robert La Tourneaux during his illness with AIDS until his death on June 3, 1986 at the age of 44.
Robert La Tourneaux, who plays the Cowboy, was first spotted by Mart Crowley at a party on Fire Island. La Tourneaux actually worked as a hustler at the time. As the role only features a handful of lines, Crowley and stage director Robert Moore cast La Tourneaux in the part despite not having prior acting experience. After re-creating his performance in the film version, La Tourneaux developed a heavy drug habit, and returned to hustling before his death due to AIDS, in 1986.
Associate producer Kenneth Utt has 26 credits as associate producer, producer, or executive producer. Of those, the 26th and last film he produced prior to his death, was Philadelphia (1993) (coincidentally, a film about a gay man dying of AIDS). At the time of the release of Philadelphia (1993), five cast members from The Boys in the Band (1970) had succumbed to AIDS, the last - Kenneth Nelson, just two months before the release of Philadelphia (1993).
The original off-Broadway production of "The Boys in the Band" opened at the Theatre Four on April 15, 1968 and closed on September 6, 1970, after more than 1,000 performances. The original play had a short revival at the Lucille Lortel Theater, Greenwich Village, from August 6 to October 20, 1996.