By Claire Faulkner
Directed by Joel Montague, rock opera “Rent” follows a group of friends for a year who struggle to cope with life, love, drugs and AIDS.
Fast-paced, highly visual and with amazing sound, this production succeeds in portraying life and difficulties in modern America.
The stage and set are incredible and used in an inventive and thought-provoking ways.
The performances were choreographed down to the second, which demonstrates both the work and commitment which has been put into this production by the cast and crew.
The leads all delivered powerful performances and sounded outstanding when they sang together.
Matt O’Donnell was well cast as ‘Mark’, a would be film maker who records his friends for a documentary.
Joel Montague as ‘Roger’ and Jess Mullock as ‘Mimi’ complemented each others performance.
Mike Bradley and Joel Harper as ‘Collins’ and ‘Angel’ portrayed a couple whose love and devotion to each other inspires hope and salvation for the other characters, teaching them to forgive and move forward with their lives.
A few tears were shed in the audience on Wednesday night at the tragedy which unfolds for these two characters.
Yzzy Pierce-Higham, once again gives a great comedy moment during the protest scene when delivering a piece of modern performance art as ‘Maureen’. Jo Butterworth as ‘Joanne’ sang from her soul, as did Ryan Bearpark who played ‘Benny’, the former friend and now landlord.
Testament to how much they enjoyed the production, the audience at the Lyceum gave a standing ovation on opening night
I don’t blame them for that, I was standing too.
“Rent” is on at the Lyceum until Saturday May 19.
Jonathan Larson, the Playwright for RENT died 2nd February 2009. He died from an aortic dissection, which is a tear in the artery that takes blood away from the heart. It was believed to be caused by Marfan syndrome.
The night before his revolutionary rock musical opened on Broadway. He had gone to two different New York City hospital emergency departments complaining of chest pain. The first diagnosed him with food poisoning and the second blamed the flu. In the middle of the night, without the emergency surgery that could have saved his life, Jonathan died alone in his New York City apartment. It was ten days before his 36th birthday.
Marfan syndrome is an inherited disorder of the body’s connective tissue that affects men and women of any race or ethnic group.
I have Marfans Myself and was fortunate enough to have the life saving surgery at the age of 14, 27 years ago.
The Marfan Trust which is the UK research charity for Marfan Syndrome. If Anybody would like to donate to the charity please follow this link >>>
http://www.marfantrust.org/how_you_can_help/donations/donate_online/