HOMELESS TO HARVARD

The young daughter of drug-abused parents, Liz Murray (Golden Globe nominee Thora Birch, American Beauty) was raised in poverty and survived alone on the streets. One day she decided to reclaim her life. This is her true story.

As a student at New York’s Humanities Preparatory Academy and the winner of a New York Times scholarship to Harvard, Liz, reflects on where she is today. Her current status is more than an achievement—it’s a miracle. Having been raised in abject poverty by drug-addicted parents, Peter (Michael Riley, Amistad) and Jean (Kelly Lynch, Charlie’s Angles), Liz was left to fend for herself. Conditions worsened still when her mother contracted AIDS, and she returned to live out her last days in the nightmare world of her own abusive father.

At the age of 15, the young girl’s life was in a downward spiral. Hopeless and afraid, living on the streets with her best friend Chris (Makyla Smith, Queer as Folk), Liz needed something to scare the life into her. Profoundly affected by her mother’s tragic passing, Liz was forced to look at her future. At the encouragement of her father, she returned to high school. Then, on a school trip to Boston, Liz visited Harvard and realized her new dream. What it took to make it real was a testament to an indomitable human spirit and to the incredible will to survive against all odds.

One young woman’s personal struggle becomes an incredible portrait of survival and success in the timely, inspiring, true story, Homeless to Harvard: The Liz Murray Story.