RENT RETELLS BOHEMIAN TALE OF LOVE AND LOSS
It’s not sophisticated, but the massive bathroom lineup during intermission at the Jubilee Auditorium is a decent barometer for audience reaction to a given performance. On opening night for Rent, the lineup and the lobby buzzed with one question: “Can you hear any of the words? Is it just me? I can’t make out anything the performers are singing.”
The second half of Rent — in town as part of the 20th anniversary, North American tour of the iconic Broadway musical — seemed somewhat better (perhaps one of the technical people had to use the washroom). But sound quality significantly marred what should have been a stellar kickoff to a five-night run in Edmonton.
That issue aside, Rent is a landmark musical from the 1990s, a slice of the artistic life in New York’s East Village as the new millennium loomed. Loosely based on Puccini’s sprawling opera, La Boheme, the musical (which clocks in at two hours and 45 minutes) dials in on the lives of artists living in poverty.
These ragged souls live in terror of an undignified death by AIDS and are dizzy with lack of food. There is no heat in their scant apartments and they are plagued by cheerful, clueless phone calls from parents who wonder ... why?
And yet, the call of art is powerful.
“One song to redeem this empty life,” moans Roger (Coleman Cummings), desperately strumming his guitar toward something worthwhile.
That so many artists labour long and often fruitlessly in
pursuit of that perfect, moving moment is at the heart of Rent. In fact, arguably the most powerful draw of Rent is its tragically true backstory.
Working with playwright
Billy Aronson, Jonathan Larson wrote the book, music and lyrics for Rent over a four-year period while waiting tables at the Moondance Diner in Soho. He brought it to the New York Theatre Workshop in 1993, where it had a staged reading, followed by a strenuous rework to wrestle the piece, which was lengthy and sclerotic with songs, into shape for an off-broadway premiere in 1996.
Tragically, Larson died of a ruptured aorta at 36 the night before the play opened in previews. Posthumously, he captured the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and several Tony awards when the show went to Broadway (where it ran for 12 years), including best musical, best book of a musical and best original score.
Some critics claim that Rent, which sacrifices the quality of relationships between characters for quantity and novelty, would never have had its artistic and financial success (it grossed $280 million on Broadway and has been raking it in on the road ever since) without the tragedy of Larson’s personal life. Indeed, it is impossible to separate Larson’s story from that of the characters in Rent (which contains significant autobiographical components), which is just fine by me. Audiences benefit from a visceral understanding of the artistic drive.
The show opens on Christmas Eve as Roger and Mark, a filmmaker played charmingly by Cody Jenkins, detail their hardscrabble existence while fending off the demands of a former roommate, Benjamin (Juan Luis Espinal), who has escaped poverty by marrying a wealthy woman and has come back to the Village to collect rent he claims he is owed.
Here, the song Rent begins to shape the many facets of this concept. It is a price paid for accommodation, naturally. But it’s also linked to expressions of love (can a heart ever be truly owned?) A rent is a ripping wound and a line drawn in the sand, as in “we’re not gonna pay rent, ‘cause everything is rent.”
Other characters quickly populate the first act, including Tom Collins (the soothing Shafiq Hicks), a gay anarchist professor who tries to pop by the apartment but is mugged before he can make it. His injuries are tended to by a street drummer, Angel — the musical’s most engaging character (memorably played by Joshua Tavares). The two are HIV positive and the beating heart of Rent — beautifully rendered through the song I’ll Cover You (“with 1,000 sweet kisses.”)
Other love stories are sketched out, such as that between Roger and the drug-addled Mimi (an exotic dancer played by Aiyana Smash). Joanne (Samantha Mbolekwa), a lawyer, and Maureen (Kelsee Sweigard), an avant-garde diva, struggle to reconcile their tumultuous relationship, but their connection is tenuous and hard to appreciate.
Rent is commonly criticized for being dated, its themes robbed of meaning by changing social mores. But it’s also possible to see the musical as a period piece. That it’s no longer shocking for your wife to leave you for a woman takes some oomph from Mark’s story; the detail becomes a stage prop, like the show’s giant cellphones and parachute pants.
But the whole experience is a reminder of a time, now passed, when much of artistic life was lived against the backdrop of loss and decay. The musical invites the audience to forget regrets and to live in the moment.
One throwback concept in
Rent will delight Edmonton theatregoers. Back in the day, show producers offered a groundbreaking discount — $20 rush seats in the front rows so artists and other bohemians could see the show. That policy continues; one hour before the curtain lifts at the Jubilee, a maximum of two excellent tickets each are available in person for $25.50.