RENT CRACKLES WITH ENERGY IN TORONTO DIGS
The Globe and Mail, December 8th, 1998
by Kate Taylor

RENT written and composed by Jonathan Larson
Directed by Michael Greif
Starring Luther Creek, Chad Richardson, and Jenifer Aubry
* * *

Rent, the boffo Broadway show about starving artists dying of AIDS, arrived in Toronto last night, with that central tension still crackling. In a Canadian production that successfully recaptures the edgy energy that has made Rent such a hit in New York, Jonathan Larson's vision of an entertaining rock musical capable of treating gritty contemporary subjects persists and often persuades.

Following in a long tradition of creators who have successfully served up Bohemia to the bourgeoisie, Larson wrote and composed a musical based on Puccini's opera La Boheme but moved the action to New York's East Village in the 1990s. Mark (Chad Richardson) is an aspiring documentary marker living in an illegal squat with his songwriting roommate Roger (Luther Creek), who is HIV-positive. Roger has a tempestuous affair with Mimi (Krysten Cummings), an exotic dancer who also has AIDS, while Mark's girlfriend Maureen (Jenifer Abury) has left him for another woman. Meanwhile, their gay pal Tom Collins (Danny Blanco) gets picked up by the big-hearted transvestite Angel (Jai Rodriguez), and the gang's newly yuppified ex-roommate Benjamin (Damian Perkins) tries to evict them from the building.

Larson died from an aneurysm in January, 1996, the night of Rent's off-Broadway dress rehearsal, so he never saw what his intensely local show would become: a Broadway hit (it's been running for a year and a half at the Nederlander Theater) and a property that producers are now putting on the road. From the point of view, this Canadian premiere at the Royal Alexandra Theatre courtesy of Mirivsh Productions quells all fears that Rent could not survive outside Manhattan. With Michael Greif, the original New York director, leading a largely Canadian cast, the show successfully makes the transition to Toronto, a city that also knows homeless, AIDS and squeegee kinds even if its contrasts are less stark. As in New York, Greif has cast a group of young actors and singers with little experience on the big-budget stage, and again the result is an immensely energetic show that often charms but sometimes dismays with its rawness.

There is a strong illustration of that phenomenon in the first act, when Creek and Cummings sing solos within a few scenes of each other, both with unpolished voices threatening to crack under the strain. One Song Glory, about Roger's desire to write a great song before he dies, is made all the more touching by Creek's vocal abandon: you can hear the singer giving his voice for you. On the other hand, Cummings's hoarse belt on Out Tonight - the number that was Daphne Rubin-Vega's showstopper in New York - is merely insufficient to the task, an anthem of living in the moment.

In this production, the star power lies elsewhere: Quebec actress Jenifer Aubry is the most arresting performer here, with a wonderfully amusing version of Maureen's bizarre performance piece protesting against the artists' eviction and a hugely sexy rendition of Take Me Or Leave Me, her defiant lesbian love song.

In a less showy role, Richardson makes Mark, the observer and narrator safely hiding behind his film camera, a figure of appealing vulnerability, anchoring the character more firmly than he was on Broadway. Indeed, if this Toronto Rent lacks some of the jolting vocal explosions of the New York version, Greif and this cast have done some work developing Larson's sketchy characters. Here, Roger, Mark, and Maureen come more fully to life, adding emotional depth to the plot, even if the drug-addicted Mimi remains something of a puzzle. Tom Collins a cypher and Angel, played with saccharine camp by Rodriguez, an unbearable goody two-shoes.

Toronto or New York, that's the problem with Rent: how much does an audience, well fed and warm, really feel for these shivering souls? At its best, with its quick cutting lyrics and satisfying rock score (rendered here by conductor Rick Fox and the onstage band), Rent can make these HIV-infected bohemians the equal of Hair's drug-smoking hippies. Bit it can also leave one humming along with the homelessness - which was surely not Larson's point.