Rent speaks vividly to artistic struggles of today, at Metro Theatre from September 5 to 20

The rock musical’s creator and composer, Jonathan Larson, didn’t live to see its enduring success

By Janet Smith

Rent’s Laren Steppler and Nicole Laurent. Photo by Matt Reznek

Mary Cleaver and Paula Higgins in Rent. Photo by Matt Reznek

Metro Theatre presents Rent from September 5 to 20

RENT IS ONE OF those shows where—as tick, tick... BOOM!, the 2021 biopic about composer Jonathan Larson, proved—the story behind the show is as compelling as the one within the show.

The hit rock musical follows a group of New York City artists dealing with the HIV/AIDS crisis in the late ’80s—and trying to pay rent. It ran for 12 whole years on Broadway, had several national tours and numerous international productions, and was adapted into a 2005 film version directed by Chris Columbus. And as a new production by Metro Theatre will show again, the story is timeless: not only does it speak directly to the space crunch that artists face in this city at a time of skyrocketing real estate, and the importance of chosen family, but its issues stretch back more than a century, as far as the Paris of the opera La Bohème, which Larson loosely based his script on.

But Larson didn’t live to see the decades of success that his production would enjoy: the creator and composer died on January 25, 1996, at just 35 years of age—the night before Rent‘s off-Broadway premiere, after six years of tireless work. He suffered an aortic dissection believed to have been caused by undiagnosed Marfan syndrome. Many of Larson’s own experiences, as a young Gen-X artist sharing a cramped SoHo apartment with his best friend, found their way into Rent’s stories and characters.

Metro Theatre’s production, directed by local musical-theatre veteran Shel Piercy, brings to life the rock score with energized choreography by Shelley Stewart Hunt, and Starlynn Chen’s sets and costume designs flashing back to the ’90s.

It’s a chance to relive the iconic ballad “Seasons of Love”, the anthemic “La Vie Bohème”, and the earworm love song “Light My Candle”—while also paying tribute to Larson. 

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