Rent (1996 Original Broadway Cast)

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Music reviews of Rent (1996 Original Broadway Cast)

Music Review: Needs revision
Rating: 3 Stars

And indeed, RENT is magnificent in many ways. Larson parallels the life of twenty-somethings struggling to get by in 1990s Greenwich village with the impoverished artists of the Puccini opera LA BOHEME. Tuberculosis has been replaced by AIDS. The show crackles with rock-style energy. It looks at people and lifestyles that have never been seriously addressed by the theater, let alone the musical theater. (I lived outside of New York in the late 90s, and I am of the same generation as Larson, but I have never met anyone like these characters. The closest anyone has come are my college classmates who never thought about what they would do with their lives after they received their diplomas.) Parents beware: a large part of the lives of these characters revolve around drugs and sex, discussed in the frankest of terms.

However, the death of Larson has left most people unable to state the major problem with the show: it was a work in progress. In my opinion, some major revisions (especially to the plot) would make this musical the cultural landmark it should have been.

With all that said, here is a more detailed synopsis of the show. I am going to give a lot of the plot away, so you may want to stop reading if you do not want me to spoil it.

THE PLOT:
All of Act I takes place on a single evening. Mark and Roger are financially-destitute roommates living in an dumpy, over-priced Greenwich village flat. Mark, estranged from his wealthy Scarsdale family, wants to be a video documentarian. The listless Roger (still reeling from acquiring AIDS 6 months ago from a girlfriend who committed suicide) does not do much, except noodle on the guitar he used to play. Their friend Collins is on his way to visit them when he is mugged and beaten, but eventually saved by a transvestite named Angel. Collins and Angel immediately fall in love. Meanwhile, Ben, the ex-roommate-turned-landlord of Mark and Roger, has decided to renege on his promise not to charge them rent. Ben promises to forgive the rent they owe him if they can stop Maureen, the ex-girlfriend of Mark, from leading a protest about the plan to develop the abandoned lot next door that homeless people currently reside in. As Mark rushes out to help Joanne, the current lover of Maureen, fix the sound equipment for the protest, another resident of the building stumbles in on Roger. This is Mimi; she and Roger have never spoken before. She flirts outrageously, and despite the fact that she is a drug addict, Roger finds himself strangely attracted to her. After she leaves, Collins arrives with Angel, who has come into a windfall by killing a yapping dog (whose owner just happens to be engaged to Ben) for a wealthy neighbor. Angel provides the finances for an evening celebration. Joanne and Mark fix the sound system while commiserating about the psychological tightrope one must walk when romantically involved with the manipulative Maureen. Collins and Angel attend an HIV support group, which Mark tags along to film. Mimi does a provocative dance, trying to convince Roger to go out with her. Collins dreams of escaping New York as Angel buys him a coat. We meet the self-centered Maureen in the midst of her hilarious protest performance. The whole gang goes to a local restaurant, and they break into an ecstatic celebration of the Bohemian lifestyle, to the annoyance of Ben. As they sing, Mimi and Roger discover they both have AIDS, everyone discovers that Mimi used to date Ben, and Joanne reports that the homeless people near the protest site are rioting.

Act II spans 51 weeks. It chronicles the struggle of Mark to stand for principles, the struggle of Roger to understand his relationship with Mimi, the struggle of Maureen and Joanne to maintain their own relationship, and the struggle of Collins to recover from the death of Angel.

As fascinating as the plot may be, it just seems too incredibly far-fetched. It seems absolutely impossible for everything in Act I to have occurred in just a few short hours. (Did I mention it all happens on Christmas Eve?) How can everyone be so shook up by the death of guy whose attributes consist solely of the ability to cross-dress and to tell everyone to be nice to each other?

THE MUSIC AND LYRICS:
Larson wrote some incredible music. The energetic Act I finale, La Vie Boheme, almost justifies why these characters lead such a poverty-stricken devil-may-care lifestyle. The lamentation that Mark and Joanne share as they dance, Tango: Maureen, is hilarious. The Act II opener, Seasons of Love, is beautiful. While some of the other music does not appeal to me, I must admit it is fresh and creative.

THE CAST:
For the most part, the cast does a great job. My only beef is with Daphne Rubin-Vega, who plays the part of Mimi. She has a whiny, childlike voice, which does not seem to match the character of a worldly-wise drug-riddled exotic dancer.

RECOMMENDATION:
RENT is a historically-important musical, but it is seriously flawed. Its music and message provided a voice to a new generation in much the same way A CHORUS LINE did in the 1970s. However, it is up to the listener to determine if this music and message are worth hearing.

Description of Rent (1996 Original Broadway Cast)

Transposing Puccini's 100-year-old opera La Bohème into modern day Bohemia (19th-century Paris's Left Bank becomes late-20th-century New York's East Village where the scourge of tuberculosis becomes the plague of AIDS) Rent celebrates life among the young, sick, and unconventional. While Broadway shows are hardly the place for authentic portrayals of the latest marginalized hipsters, composer Jonathan Larson (who died at age 36, days before his musical opened) managed to sculpt vivid characters and scenes that bring Avenue A as close as it will ever come to 42nd Street. And by telling a socially relevant story of living without the guarantee of a future (renting, that is), Larson does his own little bit to define an X'ed generation. At worst, Rent is the Hair of the '90s.

For the majority of us who won't be seeing Rent anytime soon, the Original Cast Recording is more than just an after-show souvenir. Well-packaged with a complete libretto, the two-CD set is a worthwhile album separate of live performance. Full of songs that are funny and catchy, inspiring and touching, smart and hip and not overly sentimental, Rent mixes showtune pop with elements of rock, R&B, dance, gospel, and tango to make one of the best albums of the year--certainly the best rock opera in decades. La vie bohème, indeed. --Roni Sarig

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