Glowing reviews hailed Larson’s swan song as the “ ‘Hair’ of the ‘90s” and soon limousines were wending their way past the East Village bodegas and coffeehouses to the tiny theater on East 4th Street. But that changed dramatically after “Rent” opened on Feb. While Larson had previously shown promise with two comparatively modest shows (“Superbia,” “JP Morgan Saves the Nation”) and had won prestigious theater grants, he was largely unknown among New York’s theater-going public at the time of his death. 25, the day “Rent” was to begin previews at NYTW, Larson died suddenly of an aortic aneurysm. “ All the more affecting, therefore, that on Jan. Indeed early in “Rent,” a character sings of writing one song “. The prevalence of violence and HIV in the stories of these characters suffuses the musical with the fragility of life, the theme of Puccini’s opera. The Jonathan on the minds of almost everyone in the room was Jonathan Larson, the 35-year-old author and composer of “Rent.” It is his life and the lives of his friends that are reflected in the musical, a raw and exuberant celebration of bohemian East Village artists-drag queens, drug addicts, performance artists and vagrants-living on the edge.
He’s the one person responsible for all of this, and it sucks that he’s not here to enjoy it with us.” “This has been an insane experience-it’s like having been struck by a bolt of lightning,” said 25-year-old Daphne Rubin-Vega, who plays Mimi Marquez, an S/M dancer at the Cat Scratch Club. And indeed, this was not just a closing: “Rent” was on its way into previews for its Broadway opening April 29, and, though no one could have known it at the party, it was also on its way to winning the Pulitzer Prize for drama last week, two more stops in what has been one of the most extraordinary journeys in recent theater history.īut amid the celebration, a palpable ghost was in the room.
For one, television cameras and reporters were present at what had all the giddy earmarks of a bon voyage party. Onstage, friends and creative personnel, including director Michael Greif, mingled with the youthful cast and band in the kind of pizza-and-beer ritual that has been repeated countless times in experimental theater spaces.īut this celebration was distinctly different. It was closing night for the new musical “Rent” at the New York Theatre Workshop, a 150-seat East Village theater where the pop opera, loosely based on Puccini’s “La Boheme,” opened in February.
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