Every Type of Person: a comparison essay

A. Shaunard
10-9-2007
Every type of person-

Very, very rare is the moment that we come upon a masterpiece that is utterly timeless. Perhaps there is quite a bit of literature, artwork, or music that can be read, seen, or heard by any ear and interpreted perfectly, but the demographic is getting shallower as time passes. And even if something is considered a classic by most, chances are good that it won’t appeal to every type of person. One of the only universal classics that may come to mind, at least in theatre, is the Lion King. It applies to the lives of young children, teenagers, young adults, the middle-aged, and the elderly, which is an incredible feat. It could have appeared a hundred years ago in theaters and still had a burst of success.
Then again, there are many works that remained classic through reworking, reestablishment, and rebirth. When Henri Murger read Scenes de la Vie de Boheme, he was inspired to rework it into an opera right away, and thrust aside all previous dedications to do so. He met with a bit of competition, but he worked soulfully, and the result was La Boheme.
La Boheme is the story of a group of neighbors and their mutual friends living the Bohemian life in the Latin quarter of Paris. When encountered by negative feelings, they come out passionately living for creation and soul. La Boheme had friendship, endless love, and art as well as poverty, hunger, and villainy.
Alternately, in the late 1980s, a man named Jonathan Larson was inspired enough by La Boheme to produce the classic rock opera Rent, which saw infinite success while on Broadway and later in movie theaters. Rent was meant to have the same basic storyline as the original, but Larson was determined to incorporate the issues and events that were pressing him in his modern life. There were changes between the pieces, such as homosexual relationships and AIDS, drug-use/abuse, and the death of Mimi (the only character whose name remained the same in both La Boheme and Rent), and these changes were what made the more modern Rent much easier to identify with for a person of the present.
When Rent was arranged, Larson had a goal in mind. He knew that it would not attract the average patron, so he wanted to captivate those individuals who were in the minority, those who could be deemed “unusual”. Therefore, he had to act like no other man in his position. Instead of skirting or making light of the world and its problems like so many others had done, he had to bravely tackle them head on; to say that which was theatrical taboo at the time.
This included, of course, the sexual minority audience. Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender audiences are barely, if ever, represented in the theatre industry. As far as Jonathan Larson was concerned, they had waited very patiently and were long overdue for a hero. Because of this need, Larson altered a few of the proposed relationships that made La Boheme famous. Musetta and Alcindoro, respectively, became Maureen and Joanne, a dramatic lesbian couple. Also, Shaunard and Colline shifted from being neighbors to being lovers. The addition of these two couples to the Alphabet city gang gave the play an undeniable honesty that may not be understood, but is always respected. In addition, the fact that Maureen and Joanne often argue and get extremely jealous of one another makes it easier for people to identify with them as a couple. This drew a large audience of empathetic sexual minorities and made the average person see a good example of an alternative relationship.
Another reason for sexual minority audiences to feel drawn to Rent was its repeated recognition of HIV- and AIDS-related viruses in the characters and its effects on their loved ones. Roger, Mimi, Collins and Angel (Rodolfo, Mimi, Colline and Shaunard in La Boheme) were all afflicted with incurable sexually transmitted diseases, and claimed to be “living with” them instead of dying from them. Collins and Angel were afflicted because these types of diseases can be prominent in certain gay communities and the public was unaware until it was too late for some. This high-energy gay couple met because of their common illness and made the most of every day, instead of letting themselves die in mind as well as body.
When he was sure that that characteristic had been properly represented, Larson set to work on the drug world. Rodolfo’s problem in the early acts of La Boheme is his inability to relieve himself of his writer’s block, which is frustrating him severely. Alternately, the character based on Rodolfo in Rent, Roger, is struggling with a year’s worth of drug withdrawal and a fatal HIV affliction. As Rodolfo is giving up on his writing for the day, he meets Mimi, a beautiful and mysterious neighbor whose candle has gone out. She intentionally drops her key in his loft so she can stay longer to look for it. Over a century later, Roger meets Mimi because her candle has gone out as well, but she “loses” her heroin stash instead. This, as well as the many salutes to drug-use as a Bohemian trait, allows a new audience to consider themselves documented.
Although the storylines basically remain parallel throughout most of the two pieces, there were some parts of La Boheme that didn’t sit well with Larson. La Boheme was successful, even with Mimi’s consumption-related death (a common, very contagious disease in the mid 19th century), but Larson came to the conclusion that audiences would be much happier with the ending if she lived, but came close enough to dying that the message of the film was well communicated: No day but today. Instead, he had her appear to die, but regain consciousness again moments later, claiming to have been told to return to her life on Earth by Angel’s spirit in the afterlife. This allowed people to keep their happy ending, but also to have a melodramatic twist that made them conscious of the reality of HIV. It appeared that audiences were much happier with the alteration, and Rent became one of the longest running shows on Broadway, winning the Pulitzer Prize for drama, the Obie award, the New York Drama Critics Circle award, four Tony awards, and three Drama Desk awards.
Jonathan Larson’s ability to challenge the theatre industry and capture the hearts of the Bohemians of today made Rent incredibly easy to understand and identify with. As much of a beautiful story as La Boheme was, it just didn’t quite reach the farthest audiences like Rent did. The modern version reached the darkest corners of the theater, keeping all eyes focused as well as tearful. People were proud that they were fully represented on screen, and Rent offered a lot of different ways for many demographics to do so. There may be “no day but today” to live your life, but Rent can be appreciated any day.