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written by Jonathan Larson, directed by Michael Greif

Mirvish Productions, Canon Theatre, Toronto

January 13-24, 2010

If you have somehow never seen Rent, the now-legendary musical, now is the time to see it.  Since musical closed on Broadway in 2008 after a 12-year run, the touring version now in Toronto is its only remaining live incarnation.  As it is directed by Michael Greif, the show’s original director, and stars Adam Pascal and  Anthony Rapp from the original cast, this is the closest you’ll come to experiencing what made the show such a phenomenon.  

As many will know, Rent is based on Giacomo Puccini’s 1896 opera La Bohème.  Instead of depicting starving artists in 19th-century Paris, Larson moves a century ahead to look at the lives of starving artists in 1996 Manhattan.  AIDS has replaced tuberculosis as the blight on youth.  The show was revolutionary in its stripped down production and in its positive depiction of gay, lesbian and bisexual characters.  While the opera keeps is focus primarily on the ups and downs of the relationship of Rodolfo and Mimi, the musical views them, now called Roger (Adam Pascal) and Mimi (Lexi Lawson), alongside two same-sex couples, Tom (Michael McElroy) and Angel (Justin Johnston) and Maureen (Nicolette Hart) and Joanne (Merle Dandridge).  “Seasons of Love” may be the best-known song, but Larson’s score is bursting with complex, memorable songs displaying a range of invention that puts most modern musicals to shame.  Yet, in a show so intent on depicting the harsher, grittier reality than the opera, it is all the more odd that Larson should choose, contrary to his source, a cop-out happy ending.  It’s as if Bernstein had decided that Tony, the Romeo-figure of West Side Story, should not die.

The large cast gives all-stops-out performances except, strange to say, Pascal, who sings well but seems to be on autopilot.  As a result the Roger-Mimi relationship never gels and Tom-Angel relationship, due to McElroy’s sincerity and Johnston’s incredible energy,  becomes the show’s emotional centre.  As narrator of his community’s growth and dispersal, Rapp gives a fine portrait of the artist as a victim of his own detachment.   With its credentials of authenticity this is one touring musical not to miss.  

©Christopher Hoile

Note: A version of this review appeared in Eye Weekly 2010-01-14.

Photo: Anthony Rapp, Lexi Lawson and Adam Pascal. ©Joan Marcus.