Cause Everything is Rent!!!!!!!!!!

For those who don't know me I am a RENTHead and I'm proud of it. I am watching the 2nd disk of the RENT DVD I have and It shows the documentary on Jonathan Larson and the history of RENT. Which is now going to be the main topic of this blog. So heres my version of the history of RENT:

In 1989, 29 year old Jonathan Larson composed a few songs for a new Rock-Opera musical. Two years later, he talked to a playwright named Billy Aronson to discuss about bringing musical theater to the MTV generation. Larson worked in the Moondance theater while composing this new musical called RENT. 

On January 25th, 1996, hours before the first off broadway performance of RENT and hours after he had his first and only interview, Larson died of a Aortic aneurysm at age 35. He never got to see what his musical become. The day of the first perfomance was canceled and was only run to friends and family of Jonathan Larson. After it premiered, preview ticket sales went through the roof and became one of the hottest tickets in town. On April 29th, 1996, RENT was moved to the Neaterlander Theater to make its Broadway debut.

The Original Cast was:

Mark Cohen-Anthony Rapp 

Roger Davis-Adam Pascal 

Mimi Marquez-Daphnie Rubin-Vega 

Maureen Johnson-Idina Menzel 

Joanne Jefferson-Fredi Walker 

Tom Collins-Jesse L. Martin

Angel Dumott Schunard-Willson Jermain Herida 

Benjamin Coffin the Third-Taye Diggs 

After RENT debuted, it went to be a big seller having two tours in the USA and having productions in 43 countires and translated in 22 languages. There is also a school edition which eliminates the course language(aka removing most of the play). There was also a movie that came out in 2005 but Fredi and Daphnie didn't protray there original roles as the others. They were cast by Tracie Thoms(Joanne) and Rosario Dawson(Mimi). On June 1st, 2008 RENT was suposed to close because of lack of ticket sales. However, when the announcement of the closing became broadcasted, ticket sales went up.

After 12 brilliant years and 5140 performances, RENT closed Sunday, September 7th, 2008The final performance was filmed and will show in selective theaters this Wednesday(9-24), Thursday(9-25), Saturday(9-27) and Sunday(9-28)

Does it seem, what's the word, weird/wrong to be sad that a broadway show left the great white way? I loved RENT so much, it was one of the first shows I fell in love with and seeing it not there anymore is weird. I went to the 5000th performance there and I wrote on the wall of the theater. I was in tears when the show I went to was over(and well because of the story as well). It was basically the first and last time I saw it and I'll never forget it.

I'm closing this blog by saying Thank you Jonathan Larson. Without his composing skills, we would of never heard of RENT or we would of never seen how far it came. I'm still a little upset that it closed along with a few other RENTHeads but there's a message in his show that no one should ever forget;

Theres No Day but Today<333333

-Hail=]