Family members, friends and fellow scientists talk about the life and work of British physicist Professor Stephen Hawking who at the age of twenty-one was diagnosed with the motor neuron disease A.L.S. (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), and given two years to live. Professor Hawking explains his theories on black holes, gravitational collapse, origins of the universe and his research which expanded and re-evaluated the science of cosmology. This program with its use of graphics and striking imagery is based on his successful book which made the complex concepts of physics fit ordinary language.