The Making of "Rent"

 Jeffrey Seller, the producer of "Rent," has written a memoir; he bluntly identifies one of the problems in the show. The big song Roger works hard at--"Your Eyes"--is a bad piece of writing.

Seller confesses that--after Larson's death--the producers were still worrying about how trite this particular song is. One producer joked, "It turns out that Roger is just a weak writer. The End!"

I agree that "Your Eyes" doesn't work--but I'd argue that the entire sequence also fails. "Rent" has a structural flaw. There are two stars, not one; the stars are the actors playing Roger and Mimi. When Daphne Rubin-Vega earned her Tony nomination, she was up for "Best Actress," not "Best Featured Actress." For this reason, she needs to be featured in the 11:00 number. Instead, she is half-dead while Roger sings the words of a Hallmark card into her ear. Roger and Mimi need a duet, like "Till There Was You" from "The Music Man." It's strange to me that no one recognized this.

Additionally, it's a problem that Roger's "I Want" song has nothing to do with romantic love. "One Song Glory" is about professional ambition--something that Larson clearly understood. It's not evident to me that Larson had many (or any) profound thoughts about romance.

The 11:00 number should reach back and comment on the "I Want" song. We see this--powerfully--in "Kimberly Akimbo." At the start of the show, Kim wishes for "a simple home-cooked meal, a table set for three. We'll live like normal people live." At the end of the show, Kim revises her wish in a potent way; she recognizes that her parents *cannot* be "normal people," and she loves and forgives them despite her pain.

I was never the daughter you wanted.

That's the thing we never say.

But that's the truth--and that's OK.

Before I go--let's give up the ghost.

Just be with me instead.

I know I might be dying--

But I'm not dead. I'm not dead.

This is so satisfying because it's the completion of two hours of story; we get to see Kim growing, through pain, almost "in real time." 

Back to Jeffrey Seller's book. Adam Pascal struggled to sing with his eyes open; for a long while, he was understood to be the weakest link in the cast. Roger initially performed an "I Want" song called "Right Brain." (Yikes.) There was general hand-wringing about Mimi; in certain drafts, she stayed offstage for a full thirty minutes. Producers had to ram "La Boheme" down Larson's throat to make him understand what simple, effective storytelling is. Michael Greif comes off as somewhat aloof. In the development phase, producers had to plead with Greif to rework the ending--to create a tableau with Roger and Mimi in the center. (Apparently, earlier versions of the ending had less of a "family" vibe.)

I wish that "Rent" had spent more time in the incubator. Regardless, it's fun to hear a producer's secrets; Seller's memoir is called "Theater Kid," and it's hard to put down.