Another Installment of Boozehound Theatre: Rent

Hmm…it seems that Microsoft Word recognizes the word “boozehound”. That scares me a bit.

My parents and I have a relationship where the further apart we are, the better we get along, so I tend to go home only on Thanksgiving and Christmas. But when I do go, there is a ritual that I follow to keep me sane during my four hour drive: two huge bottles of Dasani, a bag of Cheddar Cheese Pretzel Combos, and the OBC (Original Broadway Cast) version of Rent, which I sing
to at the top of my lungs. I’ve never seen the actual play, but I love the soundtrack so I was totally psyched when I heard that they were making a movie version. For some reason, I never got around to seeing in the theater, so last week I settled down with my Netflix rental and two bottles of wine.

Six of the eight principle cast members came back for the movie, so it was nice to see and hear the same people in the movie that I heard on the soundtrack. They played these characters for so long that they know them and know how to play them. However, it was painfully obvious that they were all at least ten years older than their character was supposed to be.

I was entertained, but I think I’d have to see it again to make my final judgment on it. There were parts that did seem to drag (Maureen’s protest being one of them). There was another part towards the end that seemed a bit long, but since I was drunk it seems that I’ve blocked that from my memory.

I did like that unlike Chicago, this movie didn’t cop out when it came to the musical numbers. In Chicago, all the singing and dancing occur in Roxie’s mind. In Rent, the characters burst out into song like they’re supposed to. It’s a musical dammit!

In Phantom of the Opera, a musical which is 95% singing, many of the lyrics become dialogue, something that really bothered me for several reasons.
1. I’m used to hearing these words sung. So when they’re spoken, it’s rather jarring.
2. It makes the writers seem lazy. They don’t have much to do in the first place, they can’t come up with some new dialogue?
3. Many of these lyrics rhyme, so when they’re spoken, they make the characters look like idiots. IIRC, Rent really doesn’t do this. I noticed it once in the beginning, but not after that.

Angel. As I’ve said before, I’ve never seen an actual production, but from listening to the soundtrack, I always had this feeling that Angel was the heart of the group and of the musical. He was the one that kept the them together. I didn’t get that feeling from the movie. I completely broke down when he dies, but I think I was mourning more for the musical Angel
than the movie Angel.

And whose idea was it to have Roger singing on top of a cliff in Arizona? It looked like a Creed video.