That's Justin Kirk, the gifted young protagonist of HBO's "Angels in America.'' He was talking about Mike Nichols, the director of this six-hour film adaptation of Tony Kushner's Pulitzer Prize-winning stage work. (Mike has this effect on a lot of people! You always want to do and be your best in his presence.)

Wolfing down a hearty meal of pasta and soup at the Mercer Hotel, Justin looks more robust than he does as the AIDS-ravaged "prophet" of "Angels," having regained the 20 pounds he lost to look more properly sickly. But, he was warned by playwright Kushner, "not too thin." At the time of the play's action -- 1986 -- very skinny meant you were literally a hair's breadth from dying. And his character, Prior Walter, though tormented by his disease and all manner of overwhelming visitations -- angels, ancient ancestors -- does not give up the ghost. The actor says, "I didn't eat after six; I started running, they got me a trainer. It felt a little surreal -- I'm training to look ill. I kept thinking of Prior's actual condition!" But even during sequences in which he must convey the extremes of pain, fear and wasted flesh, Justin is never less than beautiful, which gives his harrowing performance an additional layer of vulnerability.

And how did he come to give that performance, which incorporates every emotion, from campy cynical gallows humor to bitterness to desperation to redemption, all at full blast? Justin shrugs, ducks his head and says almost shyly, "I guess I do 'wounded' and 'strange' rather well." Theatergoers remember him from "Love! Valour! Compassion!" as the young gay man who was blind. He reprised the role in the film. His performance and his nudity were remarked on. (Justin is also naked in "Angels," though under circumstances -- a doctor's examination -- that are distinctly nonerotic.)

What of working with two great Oscar-winning ladies, Meryl Streep and Emma Thompson? "Am I going to surprise anyone by saying that naturally, these women are the pinnacle of acting, and I approached them with some initial fear, as I did working with Mike, or interpreting Tony's incredible words, which are so rich and funny, yet also accessible. And then to consider what this project means to so many people! But all that nervous wondering is what made this experience so extraordinary for me. People have asked if I consider this to be a 'turning point' in my career. That is impossible to know or answer. I'm an actor. I've been an actor for a long time. Each job is a ride, and you go with it, but I know whatever I do next, and whatever else happens in the future, I'll never be that scared again. Not quite."

Justin falls back from his plate of penne with a self-deprecating grin, "Look, I'm like any other actor -- I hope to get more work!" (A few years ago, Justin auditioned unsuccessfully for Mike's "The Birdcage." He's also connected to another Nichols film, "Wolf," the Jack Nicholson-Michelle Pfeiffer thriller. "I'm Michelle's dead brother. In a photograph. I don't know if Mike knew about that!")

In "Angels," Justin shares no scenes with Al Pacino, who gives the performance of his career as dying attorney Roy Cohn. (Brace yourself for his visitations from Streep as Ethel Rosenberg, the accused spy he gleefully sent to the electric chair. The acting interplay between these two giants is once-in-a-lifetime stuff!) But Justin watched this master at work. "Al was amazing," he said. "The production went on for months and months, but Al had only six weeks to film. And he did those six weeks straight, in sequence, one big scene after another. Incredible!"

Justin waxes fast, funny and fair-minded on cable news shows and their anchors, presidential candidates, the fallout over "The Reagans" -- but he wanted it off the record here. "Reading somebody's political views is boring ... unless you're a politician."

Whether or not Justin wants to speculate about the effect of "Angels" on his career, he can't stop others from talking. I predict that he, along with Ben Shenkman, who plays the weak but not uncaring lover who abandons Prior to his sickness; Patrick Wilson as the clueless, confused Mormon and Mary-Louise Parker as his savagely unhappy wife; Jeffrey Wright as Belize, the caustic, no-nonsense night nurse will see their stock rise faster than Emma Thompson takes to the air as Prior's insistent -- and sexually adventurous! -- angel.

"Angels in America" (the first half of which aired Sunday; part two premieres December 14) is Nichols' 21st time behind the camera. It has already been ecstatically reviewed, reminding us of his other classics -- "The Graduate," "Carnal Knowledge," "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" and "Postcards from the Edge." Mike, in his infinite wit and wisdom, has tapped into all that is significant in each decade and creates films that speak directly to our cultural experience.

With Kushner's visceral, resonant take on sexuality, politics, spirituality and love in all its guises, Nichols has delivered something astounding for the new millennium. Not for the faint of heart, it is for those whose hearts have been broken, repaired and beat resolutely. For those who live in hope.