Twelve years after Rent debuted on Broadway and swept across the consciousness of multiple generations (I'm in X), the curtain closed a final time in the theater on 41st St. That night was a culmination of Larson's realized, unrealized dream, witnessed by his parents and sister, and celebrated by the lucky hundreds in attendance that night. After the disappointment of Christopher Columbus's noble attempt, we finally have a definitive version of the musical to remember it by. This is it. This is the one.
All I could think, through laughter and tears, was "How much money did they spend to make that Hollywood version when all they needed to do was THIS? Set up a camera crew in the Nederlander theater and capture the show as it was intended to be seen."
Roger never sings from atop a butte here. :)
I'm sure there will be a selection of fans who were never able to see the show on Broadway or on tour who first loved the Columbus film and it's soundtrack (it's a great soundtrack, after all) and won't understand this Filmed on Broadway version without the context of being there. But, if you've never seen either version I suggest starting here. And for those of us who have seen it live, once or many times, here it is in a time capsule.
I appreciate the closeups. In the movie theater today, I wanted the crew to pull back a bit and show us the entire stage and staging more often. That's my only gripe and why I rate it a 9 out of 10. Then, I think about it on the small screen in your living room and how tiny the stage would look at that size and understand. This version is meant to take the experience home.
The bricks of the wall at the back of the stage, up where Mimi comes out to play? You can see their texture. I imagined the hands of every girl who played Mimi caressing their surfaces and thought, "We've never seen that before, not so close." The overlapping chorus of Angel buying Collins his coat, Roger introducing Mimi to Mark, and Joanne talking to Maureen on the phone has never been clearer, thanks to the camera cuts. The close-up of Angel as she's leaving the stage in death was beautiful.
The best testament to how well this transported me came afterward. My girlfriend and I walked out of the local cineplex fully immersed in Manhattan. It was jarring to see the trees of the suburbs and not the towers, noise, people, and cabs of the Theatre District. I drove away expecting the City's traffic, maybe a bridge, but we suddenly found ourselves in our hometown. So sad. I was hoping to stop at Grimaldi's.
All I could think, through laughter and tears, was "How much money did they spend to make that Hollywood version when all they needed to do was THIS? Set up a camera crew in the Nederlander theater and capture the show as it was intended to be seen."
Roger never sings from atop a butte here. :)
I'm sure there will be a selection of fans who were never able to see the show on Broadway or on tour who first loved the Columbus film and it's soundtrack (it's a great soundtrack, after all) and won't understand this Filmed on Broadway version without the context of being there. But, if you've never seen either version I suggest starting here. And for those of us who have seen it live, once or many times, here it is in a time capsule.
I appreciate the closeups. In the movie theater today, I wanted the crew to pull back a bit and show us the entire stage and staging more often. That's my only gripe and why I rate it a 9 out of 10. Then, I think about it on the small screen in your living room and how tiny the stage would look at that size and understand. This version is meant to take the experience home.
The bricks of the wall at the back of the stage, up where Mimi comes out to play? You can see their texture. I imagined the hands of every girl who played Mimi caressing their surfaces and thought, "We've never seen that before, not so close." The overlapping chorus of Angel buying Collins his coat, Roger introducing Mimi to Mark, and Joanne talking to Maureen on the phone has never been clearer, thanks to the camera cuts. The close-up of Angel as she's leaving the stage in death was beautiful.
The best testament to how well this transported me came afterward. My girlfriend and I walked out of the local cineplex fully immersed in Manhattan. It was jarring to see the trees of the suburbs and not the towers, noise, people, and cabs of the Theatre District. I drove away expecting the City's traffic, maybe a bridge, but we suddenly found ourselves in our hometown. So sad. I was hoping to stop at Grimaldi's.