‘Rent’ virtually sold out as 20th-anniversary tour hits Las Vegas
No day but today.
It’s been more than two decades since “Rent” made that assertion, but the message remains as potent as ever.
The 20th-anniversary tour of the Tony- and Pulitzer Prize-winning musical (arriving two years after its actual 20th anniversary) opens an eight-performance run Tuesday at The Smith Center. But good luck getting a ticket.
Virtually sold out weeks before its arrival, with only a handful of scattered seats remaining, “Rent” had “one of the largest pre-sales” in Smith Center history, according to John McCoy, the center’s director of performance marketing. “We knew pretty much it would be a sellout.”
The last remaining seats: $21 rush tickets, available at the box office two hours before every performance. There are 20 per performance and each buyer is limited to two tickets each.
The bargain rush tickets have been a fixture of “Rent” since the beginning, notes Smith Center vice president Paul Beard.
“In New York City, when the show (was) fresh, it was a way for kids — like the kids in the show — to have access to tickets,” Beard says. (Beard recalls that, when he was running the Bass Performance Hall in Fort Worth, Texas, those aficionados, known as “Rent”-heads, would “ignite standing ovations” at every performance.)
“Rent’s” original national tour stopped in Las Vegas in 1999 but wound up playing the cavernous casino showroom at the Las Vegas Hilton (now the Westgate).
Back then, eager young audience members arrived singing songs from writer-composer Jonathan Larson’s rock-powered score, which captures the dreams and frustrations of young bohemians in New York City’s East Village struggling to survive — sometimes literally, given their HIV-positive status.
“Rent’s” bohemians are 20th-century descendants of the 1830s Paris denizens that Giacomo Puccini immortalized in his 1896 opera “La Boheme.” Poet Rodolfo, for example, becomes rock star wannabe Roger (Kaleb Wells); roommate and friend Mark (Danny Kornfeld), an aspiring filmmaker, is based on “La Boheme” painter Marcello.
Bisexual performance artist Maureen (Katie LaMark) is “Rent’s” answer to “La Boheme’s” tavern singer Musetta, while the opera’s tubercular seamstress Mimi becomes exotic dancer, and AIDS patient, Mimi Marquez (Skyler Volpe). “La Boheme” pals Colline and Schaunard, meanwhile, become gay lovers Tom Collins (Aaron Harrington) and Angel Dumott Schunard (David Merino).
“The characters resonate,” Beard says, in part because they’re “drawn from timeless material.” But it’s also because Larson — who wrote “Rent’s” music, lyrics and book — provided not only “good storytelling” but “very, very compelling music.”
Given the musical’s instant-classic status, it’s poignant to contemplate what else Larson might have created — if he hadn’t collapsed and died of an aortic aneurysm, a week shy of his 36th birthday, on the eve of “Rent’s” debut.
Larson’s sudden, tragic demise brings “a bittersweet element” to any assessment of the musical, Beard says. But he doesn’t think Larson’s death played a major role in making “Rent” such a landmark.
“This show really came on strong in its own right,” he maintains. “The coherence in the show is attributable to Jonathan Larson. His talent blazed so bright for such a short amount of time,” but “Rent” remains “a show that has staying power.”
Contact Carol Cling at ccling@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0272. Follow @CarolSCling on Twitter.
From 'Rent' to 'Hamilton'
If you think "Hamilton" is a once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon, think again.
Every decade or so, a Broadway musical (or two) comes along that not only pushes the art form forward but captures — and reflects — the times.
Think "West Side Story" (1957) or "Hair" (1968), "Company" (1970) or "A Chorus Line" (1975).
Powered by Jonathan Larson's rock-tinged score and its contemporary take on universal themes — love, money, death — "Rent" became a Broadway juggernaut, inspiring legions of "Rent"-heads — including "Hamilton" creator Lin-Manuel Miranda.
Miranda would grow up to win his own Tonys and Pulitzer for "Hamilton" — not to mention his first best musical Tony for "In the Heights," which opened a few months before "Rent" ended its 12-year Broadway run of more than 5,000 performances.
During that run, Miranda saw "Rent" and "had an 'a-ha!' moment the first time," according to a 2015 Playbill.com article about "Hamilton's" initial off-Broadway launch. "The show exists, and people go, 'That's for me. I can do that show,' " Miranda told Playbill.com's Michael Gioia.
"Hamilton's" original Aaron Burr, Tony winner Leslie Odom Jr., also revealed a "Rent" connection.
"I heard this really great quote not too long ago that said, 'An artist spends their entire life trying to get back to the place where their heart was first opened up,' and 'Rent' was certainly that for me as a 12- or 13-year-old kid," Odom said. "It opened up my heart and my senses, and ('Hamilton') is the first time that I'm back there."
By the time "Hamilton" became a phenomenon all its own, "Rent's" time had passed. (As one of its most stirring songs asserts, "There's only now, there's only here …")
But true believers, like Miranda, remember.
Last year, when sales of "Hamilton's" cast recording surpassed "Rent's" (with 1.285 million copies), Miranda took to Twitter to reflect on the milestone — by answering more than two dozen fan questions with selected "Rent" lyrics.
When the tweet-fest ended, Miranda signed off with "Oh, that was fun! Every lyric is still in my brain (and) the database is intact. Love you, love 'Rent,' have a lovely afternoon!"
