Youth, Identity, AIDS, It’s All Here

The exhilarating, seminal Broadway rock opera, “Rent,” is exploding on the Tri-Arts stage in an exciting, propulsive, moving production that is the best I’ve ever seen there. Based on Puccini’s “La Boheme,” the show was created — book, music and lyrics — by Jonathan Larson, who died the day before its off-Broadway opening. Tragic but apropos, perhaps, since “Rent” is about a group of young people confronting death for the first time. Paris is now the East Village of New York City, tuberculosis is now AIDS, and death itself — so romanticized in 19th-century music, art and literature — is confronted and ultimately defied. “Rent” was not the first rock opera on Broadway: The Who’s “Tommy” came first; but that show’s characters never seemed real. Nor was it the first show about youthful angst, anarchy and confusion: “Hair” claimed that distinction with its spaced-out hippies protesting the Vietnam War. But “Rent” is the first to combine rock music with real characters to deliver a powerful, coherent, theatrical punch. And just as “Oklahoma” changed the direction of American musical theater, “Rent” opened the stage door for “Spring Awakening,” “Next to Normal” and even Green Day’s “American Idiot.” If you know “La Boheme,” you’ll recognize Larson’s reimagined characters with new names: Rodolfo is now Roger, Marcello is Mark, Mimi is still Mimi. And you’ll be charmed by his musical quotations from the opera: “Musetta’s Waltz” surprises more than once. Larson also mixes styles — mostly rock, but salsa, Motown, reggae, with a liberal dash of Sondheim and a nod to Burt Bachrach — into a driving, brilliant, touching score that combines solos, duets, multi-voice operatic ensembles and even a charming, brief chorale of baffled parents. The music, lyrics and occasional dialogue are delivered by a young cast (except for beloved Duane Estes) so talented that they can take your breath away. Jordan Stanley’s Mark, the play’s narrator and keeper of the community’s story (he’s a filmmaker) is endlessly compassionate, naive, sincere; Jared Weiss’s HIV-positive Roger is both needy and wary. They both sing brilliantly, and Weiss’s “One Song Glory” is amazing. As Mimi, Monica Wright, only 18, is sexy, needy, and maybe a bit too vital to be so near death; her “Without You” is wonderful. Meggan Utech as Joanne, the Harvard-trained, lesbian lawyer, has the most powerful voice on stage, which she flings out with assurance. Her on-again, off-again lover, Maureen, is played by Alexandrea Tocco, who offers a brilliant comic turn in “Over the Moon.” But the heart of the play — and this production — belongs to Kanoa Goo, whose doomed drag queen Angel holds the community together with kindness, optimism and love. Goo, a truly beautiful young man, is brilliant. His love scenes with Jesse Havea as Tom Collins, also very good with a powerful voice, are believable and moving. (And, yes, folks, they kiss. So do Joanne and Maureen. So do Roger and Mimi. Love, thank goodness, can come to all of us.) Director John Simpkins and choreographer MK Lawson move the cast through and upon scaffolds in Erik D. Diaz’s gritty, industrial loft-like set that is brilliantly lighted by Chris Dallos. The action and music flow seamlessly from the front to the back wall of the stage, from its floor to its highest reaches. The intelligent, fast lyrics are almost always understandable in Graham Stone’s sound design, particularly crucial to understanding the complicated relationships of the characters. “Rent” is a powerful evocation of youth searching for identity. It is both of its time — the AIDS epidemic — and of our time. In TriArts’ breakthrough production, the honesty of Larson’s creation is respected and refreshed while the show takes TriArts to a new, more contemporary place. Bravo. “Rent” runs at TriArts’ Sharon Playhouse through July 24. Call 860-364-7469 or go to www.triarts.net for tickets.

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